Chattoo, The Laughter Effect I. B. The Why and Potential of Comedy
In May (2017), Caty Borum Chattoo, co-director of the Center for Media and Social Impact at American University and a comedy fan, released “The Laughter E...
Tag: standup
Carnival II: Real Action
In a previous post, I discussed a common, simple model of carnivalesque that was based off the idea of a Roman Catholic celebration of Carnival prior to Lent wr...
Iliza Shlesinger and Jokes About Vaginas
Controversy I’m a fan of Iliza Shlesinger; seen her live, watched all her specials. So when, on Monday (6/12/2017), Deadline’s Matt Grobar posted an...
Wise Fools Speaking Truth to Power
When talking about stand-up comedy, a lot of attention is given to the figure of the wise fool. This concept is traceable back to at least the middle ages (for...
Five Popular Ideas About Audiences
Betsy Borns begins her book, Comic Lives, with a chapter on audience, yet while the motive for audience attendance is clear (tension release, in her opinion), w...
Nathan Mills on Hasan Minhaj and Comedy Audiences
Talking about Hasan Minhaj’s new Netflix special, Homecoming King, Nathan Mills of The Joplin Globe has a lot going on, but I want to call attention to th...
Play Space – Johan Huizinga
Several theories of humor address the idea of the spaces where it takes place as being in part, how we approach it. Johan Huizinga has one such theory. Play an...
Political, Social and Entertainment Comedians
Comic and internet sensation Kenny Sebastian, in an interview with Letty Mariam Abraham of Mid-day (5/14/2017) about his recent special, Don’t Be That Guy...
Narrators: Unreliable and Discordant
The idea that we can influence people with words (rhetoric) depends on the notion that the speaker is who they appear to be and mean what they say. Scholars ca...
Spatial Theories
The basic idea of a space for ideas comes from Aristotle, who argues that we organize ideas spatially in our mind. We group like with like into genres, topics,...