Political Comedy as Fuel for Populist Rhetoric?

In popular culture, politics are frequently framed with negative stereotypes, and there is some overlap between the anti-establishment rhetoric of political humor and populist challengers. This article probes similarities shared by politicians as presented in the television comedies Eichwald MdB (about a backbencher in the Bundestag) and Ellerbeck (about a kindergarten teacher turned mayor) and supporters of the (right-)populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD). The analysis of the storylines uncovers representations of self-serving and incompetent politicians that align with the fundamental critique expressed by the AfD. However, the negative depictions in the shows are interwoven with positive elements that speak to a responsiveness of democratic institutions. The two case studies help us better understand the specific form of German political satire produced by a public broadcaster and how satirical entertainment oscillates between negativity and meaningful critique of political power.

From Disgust to Delight: Schadenfreude in the Creation of Left-wing Subjectivity

<p><b>The concept of schadenfreude in the Oxford English Dictionary is understood as ‘the pleasure derived from the misfortune of others’, understood in this research as a sensation or “pre-cognitive intensity”, which affords the subject a certain self-satisfaction in an automatic, unconscious process. Left-wing, late-night political comedy news shows validate the use of a ‘justice-based’ schadenfreude, based on the perceived deservingness of the misfortune of conservative figures, as shorthand to inform and confirm their viewers’ subject position as liberal thinkers.</b></p> <p>By focussing on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, this thesis sets out to claim that schadenfreude, both found immediately in Daily Show content and in an extended ‘mood landscape’ fashioned via remediation of the original content, operates to become a key signifier of left-wing subjectivity.</p> <p>Following Benedict Spinoza, this research presents a two-sided vision of schadenfreude as an ‘affect’, positing that it entails an equation of ‘disgust’—based on “trajectories of repulsion” from an external affecting body—and ‘delight’, along an axis of conservative misfortune. This project highlights the intersection between mediated schadenfreude and Judith Butler’s paradoxical elements of subjectivity; subjection, and becoming a subject. To develop this question further, the thesis turns briefly to right-wing spheres of schadenfreude, a secondary location to ascertain theextent of the ‘ephemerality’ of affect as it is placed in media structures.</p> <p>Through analysis of the show’s semiotic and rhetorical techniques of analogy, intertextuality, and vignette across various video clips on YouTube, and their adoption by secondary media institutions such as The Guardian and The New York Times, the thesis isolates the manner in which mediated schadenfreude works to interpellate the audience and craft a left-wing ‘mood’, using the conservative body and its humiliation as a site to articulate liberal political subjectivity.</p>

From Disgust to Delight: Schadenfreude in the Creation of Left-wing Subjectivity

<p><b>The concept of schadenfreude in the Oxford English Dictionary is understood as ‘the pleasure derived from the misfortune of others’, understood in this research as a sensation or “pre-cognitive intensity”, which affords the subject a certain self-satisfaction in an automatic, unconscious process. Left-wing, late-night political comedy news shows validate the use of a ‘justice-based’ schadenfreude, based on the perceived deservingness of the misfortune of conservative figures, as shorthand to inform and confirm their viewers’ subject position as liberal thinkers.</b></p> <p>By focussing on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, this thesis sets out to claim that schadenfreude, both found immediately in Daily Show content and in an extended ‘mood landscape’ fashioned via remediation of the original content, operates to become a key signifier of left-wing subjectivity.</p> <p>Following Benedict Spinoza, this research presents a two-sided vision of schadenfreude as an ‘affect’, positing that it entails an equation of ‘disgust’—based on “trajectories of repulsion” from an external affecting body—and ‘delight’, along an axis of conservative misfortune. This project highlights the intersection between mediated schadenfreude and Judith Butler’s paradoxical elements of subjectivity; subjection, and becoming a subject. To develop this question further, the thesis turns briefly to right-wing spheres of schadenfreude, a secondary location to ascertain theextent of the ‘ephemerality’ of affect as it is placed in media structures.</p> <p>Through analysis of the show’s semiotic and rhetorical techniques of analogy, intertextuality, and vignette across various video clips on YouTube, and their adoption by secondary media institutions such as The Guardian and The New York Times, the thesis isolates the manner in which mediated schadenfreude works to interpellate the audience and craft a left-wing ‘mood’, using the conservative body and its humiliation as a site to articulate liberal political subjectivity.</p>

BUILDING COMIC IMAGINATION THROUGH POLITICAL PARODY: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS ON DONALD TRUMP IN THE PRESIDENT SHOW AND SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE’S THE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

The number of Americans watching political comedy shows has significantly growing recent years. The views increase as TV channels spread their programs into social media, such as YouTube. The comic and funny aspects depicted in the political parody can be in the forms of imitation, impersonation, and reflection of one’s character, expression, and appearance. This paper aims to investigate American TV programs, The President Show and Saturday Night Live’s The Presidential Debate, by employing humor theory seen from Van Dijk’s critical discourse analysis. The dialogues used by the impersonators are analyzed to figure out the elements of funny features, comedy, and parody. Hence, the purpose of this study is to answer whether or not the discourse mechanism can build humor in The President Show and Saturday Night Live’s The Presidential Debate. The data apply ten Comedy Central’s YouTube videos and four Saturday Night Live’s YouTube videos. The data comprises of political and power discourse. The analysis concludes that both shows utilize some aggressive strategies to criticize Trump’s character, such as metaphor to represent policies, contrast to illustrate positive self-representation, and hyperbole to demonstrate racism. While Saturday Night Live applies Hillary Clinton to contrast Trump’s image. Saturday Night Live contrast Trump by applying strategies such as disclaimer, implication, incongruity, aggressive, and illustration to criticize his personalities and his controversial political decisions.

Political Humor, Sharing, and Remembering: Insights from Neuroimaging

Over the last two decades, news-oriented comedy programs have risen to compete with traditional hard news media as sources of information about politics. To the extent that a politically knowledgeable electorate is necessary for a thriving democracy, understanding the mechanisms underlying the extent to which political comedy facilitates or inhibits a well-informed citizenry is critical. Across two studies, we use behavioral experiments and neuroimaging to examine the causal effects of humor on the desire to share and the capacity to remember political information. We find that humor increases the likelihood to share political information with others and enhances people’s memory for information. Humor also increases brain response in regions associated with understanding other people’s mental states (i.e., mentalizing), which advances a theoretical framework that humor may facilitate considerations of others’ views (e.g., how other people will respond to shared political information).

Political Comedy as a Gateway to News Use, Internal Efficacy, and Participation: A Longitudinal Mediation Analysis

Despite a great deal of research, much about the effects of political comedy programming on its viewers remains uncertain. One promising line of work has focused on increased internal political efficacy—the sense that one is competent to engage with politics—as an outcome of exposure to political comedy programs. This may explain results showing that viewers are more likely to participate in politics. We extend this approach by considering the role of political comedy’s “gateway” effect in encouraging political media consumption, which can promote additional increases in efficacy and participation. This study provides a theoretical synthesis of prior research and a rigorous empirical test using a representative panel survey of adults in the United States, providing evidence of a relationship between political comedy and participation with both news use and internal efficacy serving as mediators. Furthermore, we find that only political satire, not late-night talk shows, appear to produce these effects.

The Counterculture Comics versus the Hate Clubs of the Air

This chapter describes what is referred to as the first generation of American irony and outrage of the 1960s: the radical counterculture comedy of the 1960s versus conservative talk radio programming. While conservative voices on limited-circulation radio stations around the country were railing against the United Nations and a liberal United States Supreme Court, liberal activists in New York and San Francisco were producing a very different kind of political information that was antiwar, antisegregation, and anti–status quo: ironic social and political satire in smoky underground comedy clubs and coffeehouses. The chapter provides historical details about conservative radio shows hosted by people like Clarence Manion and Dan Smoot, and contrasts these shows’ voice and approach with that of radical satirists of that same era, particularly that of the improvisational political comedy theatre company The Committee, including insights from interviews with members of the group.