some thoughts on humor
After our class on Tuesday, I’ve found myself fascinated in all the ways comedy is used, subtle or not. I liked Chico’s definition of satire as being something that destroys something else, hopefully in order to build something on top of it. I had never thought about it that way before. This week, and in the article on Black humor that we read, humor has been described as something that protects, attacks, heals and empowers people. Thinking about humor in all of these different contexts was actually sort of mind blowing to me, but I think that might be reflective of how little I’ve really thought about or valued humor in my own life.
For me personally, I always associated the word humor with “stand up comedy” exclusively. I don’t know if that speaks to the prevalence or popularity of stand up in America, but that’s always what I sort of conflated the idea of humor with. Obviously humor takes forms in different mediums like visual art, literature, performance art etc. But to me it says a lot that the first thing I associate (typically) when the word humor comes out is stand up. Maybe it is because it is the most visible in our culture? The most subversive? The most offensive? The most honest? I think it probably has something to do with the cult of personality (or celebrity) that America has, and once someone gains notoriety we’re more inclined to listen to them and flock to them. I also think that stand up is something that is close to universal, at least in our culture. There is seemingly a comic for anybody (for better or for worse). Regardless, it is a powerful platform to have.
Thinking about humor this week, it’s really dawned on me that it is a sort of universal language. I think that this can be an incredibly powerful tool, especially for marginalized people.