"Joking Generation" in 10th grade literature exam

(Dan Tri) - The 2025 entrance exam for grade 10 literature at the Gifted High School has brought up an interesting and topical topic: "The Joking Generation".

Candidates taking the entrance exam for grade 10, Gifted High School in 2025 (Photo: Thuy Huong).

This topic was inspired by the character Nam's comment in the short story "Smile" by writer Nam Cao about his friend Hoat: "Quietly enduring daily discomforts, quietly suffering when pain is unavoidable, using a smile to cover up one's own sadness, so that those around one do not feel sad too... That is also courage, but a kind of courage that few people have." From there, the exam raised the issue of the "joking generation" and asked candidates to express their thoughts.

According to the notes in the exam, "joking generation" is a concept that represents the cheerful, humorous, playful spirit, creating laughter of today's young generation in life situations and circumstances. This concept is being used commonly but also causes a lot of debate with different perspectives.

The 10th grade literature exam has content about "the joking generation".

Full 10th grade entrance exam questions for Gifted High School

Recently, phrases like "Chill", "Beyond Pickleball", "Have you eaten yet, beautiful lady", "Not wow enough"... are being commonly used by Gen Z (those born from 1997 to 2012) in daily life, even in the working environment.

This communication style is considered part of a trend called "When Generation Jokes Enters the Labor Market". This trend originated from fun, humorous videos on TikTok, then spread to other social media platforms and became a "cybercultural phenomenon" that was strongly responded to by Gen Z.

On social networks, posts and videos labeled "the joking generation" have attracted millions of views and are hotly discussed. Many Facebook groups such as "The joking generation goes to work" have been created, of which the largest group has nearly 100,000 members.

From another perspective, the "joking generation" is also considered to be less serious in the traditional way, instead of being innovative, humorous, and flexible. This phrase is also often used to talk about the lack of discipline, or the "overdoing" and "craziness" of young employees in the office environment.

The literature exam on this issue requires candidates to have a multi-dimensional perspective, clearly understand its origin, characteristics and impacts in order to present positive aspects and minimize negative effects.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/giao-duc/the-he-cot-nha-vao-de-thi-ngu-van-lop-10-20250526164658676.htm