Cringe and Sympathy: The Comedy of Mental Illness in Flowers

This article on brings together findings from humor studies, especially work on cringe comedy, and disability studies. It analyzes how Flowers uses elements of cringe to question societal norms of the “proper person” in connection to mental illness, but also how Flowers broadens the genre of cringe so that, at times, it becomes a cringe tragedy rather than a cringe comedy, thus taking seriously the pain of mental illness. As a third point, this analysis focuses on the way in which Flowers self-reflexively employs elements of narrativity to draw attention to the cultural constructedness and storyfication of mental illness throughout history.

Identities are no joke (or are they?): humor and identity in Vivek Mahbubani’s stand-up

Using the lenses of humor studies and narrative analysis, this paper discusses the stand-up comedy of Vivek Mahbubani, a Hong Kong-born stand-up comedian of Indian descent. Mahbubani uses humor about ethnicity-related issues to highlight the irrationality of racial discrimination and stereotypes. Specifically, Mahbubani challenges people’s preconceived ideas about the speakerhood of Cantonese and the local identity. The present study demonstrates how this comedian has effectively built humor into his narrative as a response to oppression, thus engaging the local, ethnically Chinese audience to reflect on the social and ethnic tension felt by minorities in Hong Kong. This study further argues that Mahbubani’s comedy reflects a more general trend in stand-up comedy: humor as a vehicle for a more inclusive and progressive grand narrative across different cultures; this trend stands in stark contrast to earlier ethnic jokes that often made minorities the target of verbal humor.

Satire as safety valve: moving beyond a mistaken metaphor

The safety valve metaphor is ubiquitous in scholarship on satire and usually implies that, although the genre seems intent on upsetting the political order, it really has unintended conservative effects which maintain the status quo. Although there is previous criticism of the safety valve theory, which focuses on the inadequacy of its empirical predictions or the flawed theoretical foundations of the associated relief theory of humor, the metaphor remains in common use – and continues to obscure our understanding of satire’s political effects. What remains overlooked in humor studies is the fundamental mistakenness of the metaphor itself. We argue that comparing satire to a safety valve always implies a reasoning about the genre which is mistaken because the mechanistic function of a safety valve cannot be informatively mapped onto the political effects of satire. As a result, the safety valve metaphor is problematically opaque (because its actual meaning is unclear) and elastic (because it means whatever anyone wants it to mean). The metaphor fails to elucidate how satire works even in authoritarian political contexts, like Egypt, which should, in principle, act as a fertile ground for its purported function as a safety valve.

Nostalgia Causes a Preference for Regressive Social Change

A broad literature demonstrates that nostalgia – a positive emotion associated with sentimental longing for the past – offers many psychological benefits for the individual. In contrast, we present seven studies showing that nostalgia, measured and manipulated, is associated with increased support for regressive social norms and policy. In the first four studies, we show that nostalgia is associated with opposition to smoke-free laws, preference for unsafe cars, expressions of benevolent sexism and opposition to gender equality, and enjoyment of sexist, racist, and other politically incorrect humor. Studies 5 and 6 establish a causal connection between nostalgia and regressive social norms. Lastly, Study 7 shows preliminary evidence that nostalgia causes these preferences through perceptions of the past as sacred. These findings shed light on a darker side of nostalgia and highlight how progressive policies can be undermined by a longing for the past.

Humor in Workplace Leadership: A Systematic Search Scoping Review

Humor studies are increasingly prevalent in workplace and leadership domains, it has shown significant development in the last 40 years. The multifaceted nature of humor means varied definitions and diverse measurement approaches have been approved. As a result, research methodologies and findings are not easily clarified, and have not been synthesized. The aim of this scoping review was to review the existing body of literature relevant to humor in workplace leadership to identify key research areas, methodologies used, guiding theoretical frameworks, and gaps that are persisting over the last 40 years. Using qualitative review methods, four key themes in the research emerged relating to: (1) humor styles and outcomes; (2) humor as communication and discursive resource; (3) variables in the humor and leadership relationship; and (4) cultural context. This review demonstrates significant research progress on the topic of humor in workplace leadership. Research progress and gaps are discussed based on five key questions. Future research directions are outlined and discussed.

Discourse Markers of Humor Analysis in Trevor Noah’s Stand-Up Comedy

Discourse markers have been widely studied in various discourses such as political discourse, legal, media discourse, and even daily conversation. However, there is still a lack of discourse markers research in humor studies. This study was projected to identify the linguistic aspects of humor genre utterances in stand-up comedy performed by Trevor Noah as one of the most influential stand-up comedians. In addition, those linguistic aspect is discourse markers. The data were taken from Trevor Noah’s Video entitle "Prince Harry & Meghan Markle's Royal Wedding" Live at the O2 London. Afterward, the data were analyzed by using the theoretical framework of discourse marker and its pragmatic functions introduced by Brinton (1996). This study reveals that there are several types of discourse markers used in stand-up comedy, such as “ah”, “and”, “like”, “oh”, “alright”, “then”, “huh”, “well”, “yes/no”, and “I know/knew”. In addition, all of those discourse markers have different functions, and sometimes one discourse marker serves more than one pragmatic functions.

Kinesic Humor

Literature is one of the richest sources of information concerning the ways in which human beings are able to play with cognition. According to the theory of embodied cognition, human cognition is grounded in sensorimotricity, i.e., the ability to feel, perceive, and move. The pervading cognitive process called perceptual simulation, which is activated when we cognitively process a gesture in a real-life situation, is also recruited when we read about actions, movements, and gestures in texts. Kinesic Humor examines literary works written by major authors—including Chrétien de Troyes, Cervantes, Milton, Saint-Simon, Rousseau, Sterne, and Stendhal—in which perceptual simulations of complex sensorimotor events and kinesic interactions trigger humorous effects. Such works create anticipations regarding movements and sensations, which are unexpectedly thwarted, thus producing cognitive shifts typical of humor. By bringing together literary studies, cognitive studies, gesture studies, and humor studies, this book offers original perspectives on such important artworks as Paradise Lost, Don Quixote, and Le Rouge et le Noir. In it, the importance of rhythm and tonicity in the perception of movements and gestures is a focus of attention. The interactional significance of gestures often lies in their dynamics, and this fact also applies to the cognitive retrieval of narrated gestures during the act of reading. The method of kinesic analysis practiced in this book takes into account such cognitive features in correlation with the historical and cultural contexts in which the literary works were written.

The co-construction of humor in computer-mediated teacher-student communication

This paper investigates the way online humorous exchanges are jointly constructed and recognized by a teacher and her students. It focuses on the role humor studies play in understanding issues related to Computer-mediated Communication (CMC). The data consist of synchronous discussions of 11 Tunisian learners of English and their teacher via instant messaging on Skype. The analysis uses the notion of script oppositions (SOs) in the General Theory of Verbal Humor (GTVH) and offers an account for the internal structure of exchanges; how the exchange begins with a serious mode, how it gradually develops into a humorous play frame, and how inferences are drawn. The study reveals that humor is created by activating binary SOs and shows that the teacher/student dynamics can make joking online more difficult to interpret than joking among peers. With reference to the analysis of the specific context of the CMC discussions, a serious set up of a humorous sequence created by a teacher can leave students uncertain toward the playfulness of the sequence. A playful set up, on the other hand, makes participants engage in a joint fantasy and build new layers of meaning as the conversation develops.

Doing Humor, Seriously!: Conflict Management of Mother and Child through the Humor in the Stories of Lupus Kecil

Anchored by the findings of previous studies regarding the benefits of humor in communication, interaction and relationships, especially in the family context, this study explores the types of humor used by the mother in the Little Lupus stories to manage conflicts with her children. This research uses five stories from the Lupus Kecil (Little Lupus) series published during 1990-2000s. Data is identified, classified, and interpreted in the framework of children’s and humor studies. This study demonstrates how the mother used an affiliative, aggressive, and self-enhancing humor during conflicts with her children. Using these three styles of humor, facilitate better communication between mother and children during conflict management. This study has important implications in the context of the family relationship for a mother’s developing and using a sense of humor when managing conflict with her children. Keywords: affiliative humor, aggressive humor, self-enhancing humor, conflict management of mother and children