Whilst much humour, notably topical humour, is aimed at the broadest possible audience, it is often necessary to specialise. Contrast children's humour with adult humour, for example. Comedy for children is typically constrained by a limited vocabulary and confined to topics within the child's grasp — home life, school life, street life — while adult humour is relatively lacking in such constraints. Accordingly, children often delight in jokes that make adults yawn, simply because they are experiencing the joke for the first time.

This is an important example, insofar as children are perhaps the most prominent specialist audience for comedy, but it is not the only one. Specialist comedy is often used to target specific audiences.

For example, many Radio 4 comedy shows are deliberately aimed at capturing the twenty-something audience that the station needs to sustain it in the future, in much the same way as the sketch show Goodness Gracious Me was originally aimed at listeners of Asian origin who might not otherwise have been attracted to Radio 4.

Nor is specialisation exclusive to age and ethnic group. Comedy is often targeted on specific interest groups among the general public (cricket lovers, literary people, etc).

Meanwhile, every professional and social group has its own particular brand of comedy, not easily understood by outsiders, and often has own specialist comedians too.

CHOOSING YOUR SUBJECT

When it comes to choosing your specialist comedy subject, always remember the old writer's adage: stick to what you know.

The most convincing specialist comics are those who have spent many years living within or working with the group on which their humour is based.

It is possible to research specialist subjects, of course, but it may take many years of work to grasp the subtle intricacies that are understood or at least felt by those who live the subject.

SPECIALIST LANGUAGE

Specialist language is a crucial defining feature of many groups. In much the same way as the Inuit are said to have umpteen different words for snow, specialist groups need to create their own language to communicate amongst themselves. This specialist language provides the flash point for much humour.

Often, the language is too obscure for general consumption. This is particularly true of professional and industrial groups, whose specialist language sometimes describes obscure details of processes that are themselves beyond the comprehension of outsiders. The languages of science and the law are good examples of this. Such obscure language may provide excellent jokes for the members of the group, but it mostly renders the humour inaccessible to outsiders — unless the writer is clever enough to explain the language for outsiders within the context of the story and without boring the specialist audience at the same time.

But not all specialist language is so obscure as to limit its accessibility. The language of wine tasting springs to mind as a good example of accessible specialist language. The broad appeal of wine tasting jokes is partly due to the fact that most of the words are familiar — "raspberries with a hint of smoke" — while their contextual usage is not. The accessibility of this language means that the language can be freely used and amusingly extended in ways that appeal to group members and outsiders alike — "cockroach droppings with a hint of reprocessed plutonium".

CHARACTER

Arguably, character plays a less significant role than language in making specialist comedy specialised, though it is by no means insignificant.

Insofar as character types are universal, they tend to transcend the defining lines of specialist groups.

The human frailties that are the source of character humour — greed, stupidity, etc — are to be found in virtually all groups. Accordingly, jokes that depend principally on universal aspects of character may take on a new freshness when translated into a specialist setting.

However, certain characteristics are less prominent in certain groups, at least in theory. The undesirable human failings that are the stuff of so much character comedy are supposedly less prominent among religious and charitable groups, for example. In such cases, there is much humour to be found in the behaviour of individuals who appear out of character with the intended self-image of the group: the promiscuous bishop, the tongue-tied double glazing salesman, etc.

OUTSIDERS

Groups take delight in jokes that involve "rival" groups, particularly if the rival group is portrayed as inferior. Such jokes are particularly prevalent among regional, ethnic and religious groups — Yorkshire vs Lancashire, English vs Scots, Protestant vs Catholic, etc — but they extend to almost every conceivable social grouping. For example, professional life abounds with rivalries based on power, wealth, rank, qualification, schooling, social background, and many more.

SPECIALIST SITUATION COMEDY

In much the same way as universal character types may be imported for the enrichment of specialist comedy, characters who have been "fleshed out" in a specialist situation may also be adapted and export for universal consumption. This is particularly familiar in situation comedy whose characters inhabit a specialist world that is appropriately simplified to enable universal appeal.

The extended format of situation comedy also makes it possible to set up jokes involving complex specialist language by introducing the language over time so that it becomes understood by a non-specialist audience.