The Politics of Joking ― Anthropological Engagements

This book engages anthropologically with humor as political expression. It reveals how humor is in many instances central to human efforts to cope with political struggle and significant to understanding power dynamics in socio-political life. The chapters examine humor and joking activities across a diverse range of geographic areas and cultural contexts. The contributors consider humor as it is constituted in political anxiety, aggression and power, and when it becomes a tool to resist, repair, reconcile or make a moral claim. Collectively they demonstrate that humor can provide a powerful critique, a non-violent form of political protest and the space for restoration of human dignity.

Jana Kopelent Rehak is a Researcher in Anthropology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA and Lecturer at the University of Maryland, College Park, USA.

Susanna Trnka is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.