Comedy and Social Critique

Comedy has been used to shine a no-holds-barred light on everything from the rise of fascism to the inanities of fashion. Over the decades, it has generated a number of questions. Some of these are ethical. What can we legitimately find funny or make fun of? Are there things we shouldn't laugh at? Can and should comedy be delimited or censored? When does comedy become abuse? When does it become hate speech? Some of the questions we will consider are more general: does comedy change through history? Is it culturally specific? Is it gender-specific? Is there a point at which these specifities give way to the possibility of a form of humor common to us all and the role laughter plays across human cultures. Finally, we will explore the expressive forms of comedy, including parody, satire, slapstick, tragi-comedy, the comics, stand-up, and physical comedy which raises the question of whether comedy can be said to reside in the body. Graduate and undergraduate students welcome.