Visual narratives, like comics, at times show depictions of characters’ imagination, dreams, or flashbacks, which seem incongruent with the ongoing primary narrative. Such “domain constructions” thus integrate an auxiliary domain (e.g. a dream) within the primary domain (the expected, physical storyworld), and may require readers to resolve seemingly non-co-referential figures as co-referential (e.g. when a character’s dream shows that character as an animal). In three self-paced reading experiments, we investigate the processing and understanding of single vs. multiple domains in sequences (...) with co-reference issues (Exp. 1) and whether graphic cues facilitate such domain switches (Exp. 2 and 3). Domain switches incurred greater updating costs but were comprehensible, with greater similarity across panels predicting faster processing, and comic reading experience affecting viewing times. The successful integration of fantasized agents which seem to lack co-reference implies that visual narrative comprehension goes beyond event and scene perception alone, but also involves proficiency in conventional constructions related to perspective-taking and inferencing. (shrink)

From Wodehouse to the White House: A Corpus-Assisted Study of Play, Fantasy and Dramatic Incongruity in Comic Writing and Laughter-Talk In this paper I consider two discourse types, one written and literary, the other spoken and semi-conversational, in an attempt to discover if there are any similarities in the ways in which humour is generated in such apparently diverse forms of communication. The first part of the paper is concerned with the explicitly comic prose of P. G. Wodehouse, (...) whilst in the second part of the paper, we investigate the laughter-talk, defined as the talk preceding and provoking, intentionally or otherwise, an episode of laughter, occurring during press briefings held at the White House during the Clinton era and the subsequent Bush administration. Both studies, by employing corpus analysis techniques together with detailed discourse reading, integrate quantitative and qualitative approaches to the respective data sets. (shrink)

Is the Concept of Incongruity Still a Useful Construct for the Advancement of Humor Research? The perception of incongruity is considered to be a necessary, though not sufficient, component of the humor experience. Incongruity has been investigated in the philosophical tradition for centuries, and it goes back as far as Aristotle's definition of the comic as based on a particular form of απάτη. In modern times, many theoretical models, as well as empirical works, are based on this concept. The (...) question is here raised whether the concept of incongruity has already been examined and exploited to its full potential, and nothing new, of theoretical or experimental usefulness, may be drawn from it. It is proposed to conceptualize incongruity as follows: a stimulus is perceived as incongruous when it diverts from the cognitive model of reference. In this perspective, a number of observations are advanced which point to a heuristic property of incongruity still open to interesting developments, both for theory and for applications. (shrink)

This article bridges a gap in the study of Aristophanic humour by better demonstrating how individual jokes (in this case, the para prosdokian ‘contrary to expectation’ joke) contribute to the wider comic scenes in which they are embedded. After analysing ancient and modern explanations and examples of para prosdokian jokes, this paper introduces the concept of ‘comic bit’, a discrete unit of comedy that builds humour around a central premise, and establishes how para prosdokian jokes contribute to (...) class='Hi'>comic bits in a way that recent theories of para prosdokian cannot account for. (shrink)

Jokes are sometimes morally objectionable, and sometimes they are not. What’s the relationship between a joke’s being morally objectionable and its being funny? Philosophers’ answers to this question run the gamut. In this paper I present a new argument for the view that the negative moral value of a joke can affect its comedic value both positively and negatively.

Counters the long-standing, solemn interpretation of Plato’s dialogues with one centered on the philosophical and pedagogical significance of Socrates as a comic figure. Plato was described as a boor and it was said that he never laughed out loud. Yet his dialogues abound with puns, jokes, and humor. Sonja Madeleine Tanner argues that in Plato’s dialogues Socrates plays a comical hero who draws heavily from the tradition of comedy in ancient Greece, but also reforms laughter to be applicable to (...) all persons and truly shaming to none. Socrates introduces a form of self-reflective laughter that encourages, rather than stifles, philosophical inquiry. Laughter in the dialogues—both explicit and implied—suggests a view of human nature as incongruous with ourselves, simultaneously falling short of, and superseding, our own capacities. What emerges is a picture of human nature that bears a striking resemblance to Socrates’ own, laughable depiction, one inspired by Dionysus, but one that remains ultimately intractable. The book analyzes specific instances of laughter and the comical from the Apology, Laches, Charmides, Cratylus, Euthydemus, and the Symposium to support this, and to further elucidate the philosophical consequences of recognizing Plato’s laughter. Sonja Madeleine Tanner is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, and the author of In Praise of Plato’s Poetic Imagination. (shrink)

In 1968 E.K. Borthwick, with a brilliant conjecture, cleared up a passage from Aristophanes’Peacethat had been considered ‘nonsense’ since antiquity. ‘Bell goldfinch’ (κώδων ἀκαλανθίς) the line seemed to be saying: a jumbled idea at best, gibberish at worst (1078). The scholium reads ad loc.: ταῦτα δὲ πάντα ἐπίτηδες ἀδιανοήτως ἔφρασεν, ‘all this is said as deliberate nonsense’, and later scholars generally follow suit (W.W. Merry, for example, in his 1900 edition ofPeacerefers to the line as ‘magnificent nonsense’). But Borthwick showed (...) that this was not the case: ‘even nonsense expressions in Aristophanes’, he writes, ‘are not haphazard collocations of incongruous words signifying nothing’. What, then, to do with the ancient scholar (and those later ones) who failed to understand the passage, claiming it instead to be ‘nonsense’? (shrink)

A radical new approach to humor, where traditional targets become its agents Humor is often dismissed as cruel ridicule or harmless fun. But what if laughter is a vital force to channel rage against patriarchy, Islamophobia, mass incarceration? To create moments of empathy and dialogue between #Black Lives Matter and the police? These and other such questions are at the heart of this powerful reassessment of humor. Placing theorists in conversation with comedians, Uproarious offers a full-frontal approach to the very (...) foundation of comedy and its profound political impact. Here Cynthia Willett and Julie Willett address the four major theories of humor—superiority, relief, incongruity, and social play—through the lens of feminist and game-changing comics such as Wanda Sykes, Margaret Cho, Hannah Gadsby, Hari Kondabolu, and Tig Notaro. They take a radical and holistic approach to the understanding of humor, particularly of humor deployed by those from groups long relegated to the margins and propose a powerful new understanding of humor as a force that can engender politically progressive social movements. Drawing on a range of cross-disciplinary sources, from philosophies and histories of humor to the psychology and physiology of laughter to animal studies, Uproarious offers a richer understanding of the political and cathartic potential of humor. (shrink)

In this extended essay, Vittorio Hösle develops a theory of the comical and applies it to interpret both the recurrent personae played by Woody Allen the actor and the philosophical issues addressed by Woody Allen the director in his films. Taking Henri Bergson’s analysis of laughter as a starting point, Hösle integrates aspects of other theories of laughter to construct his own more finely-articulated and expanded model. With this theory in hand, Hösle discusses the incongruity in the characters played by (...) Woody Allen and describes how these personae are realized in his work. Hösle focuses on the philosophical issues in Allen’s major films by exploring the identity problem in _Play It Again, Sam_ and _Zelig_, the shortcomings of the positivist concept of reality in _A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy_, the relation between reality and art in _The Purple Rose of Cairo_, the objective validity of morality in _Crimes and Misdemeanors_, the power of evil in _Shadows and Fog_, and the relation between art and morality in _Bullets over Broadway_. He cites Allen’s virtuosic reinterpretation of older forms of expression and his integration of the fantastic into the comic universe—elements like the giant breasts, anxious sperm, extraterrestrials, ghosts, and magicians that populate his movies—as formal moves akin to those of Aristophanes. Both an overview of Allen’s work and a philosophical analysis of laughter, Hösle’s study demonstrates why Allen’s films have more to offer us—morally, philosophically, and artistically—than just a few laughs. “In _Woody Allen_, Vittorio Hösle goes a long way toward explaining everything you wanted to know about Allen but were afraid to ask. Just why exactly is he funny, and why does his humor have a strong appeal for academics? In his comprehensive analysis of Allen’s work, Hösle outlines a workable theory of humor, illustrates his conclusions by referring to the films and prose, and points out several philosophic motifs underlying Allen’s deceptively complex comedies. Hösle’s work elevates the enjoyment of Allen’s films from guilty pleasure to satisfying intellectual engagement with an intriguing contemporary thinker and artist.” —Richard A. Blake, S.J., Boston College “Vittorio Hösle presents a compelling overview of Allen’s work in which he discusses different theories of laughter and argues for the priority of the incongruity theory as the only one able to answer the normative question, what distinguises good from bad laughter? On this theoretical basis he goes on to delve into both the humor and the philosophical profundity of Allen’s films.” —Sander Lee, Keene State College. (shrink)

Finding something humorous is intrinsically rewarding and may facilitate emotion regulation, but what creates humour has been underexplored. The present experimental study examined humour generated under controlled conditions with varying social, affective, and cognitive factors. Participants listed five ways in which a set of concept pairs (e.g. MONEY and CHOCOLATE) were similar or different in either a funny way (intentional humour elicitation) or a “catchy” way (incidental humour elicitation). Results showed that more funny responses were produced under the incidental condition, (...) and particularly more for affectively charged than neutral concepts, for semantically unrelated than related concepts, and for responses highlighting differences rather than similarities between concepts. Further analyses revealed that funny responses showed a relative divergence in output dominance of the properties typically associated with each concept in the pair (that is, funny responses frequently highlighted a property high in output dominance for one concept but simultaneously low in output dominance for the other concept); by contrast, responses judged not funny did not show this pattern. These findings reinforce the centrality of incongruity resolution as a key cognitive ingredient for some pleasurable emotional elements arising from humour and demonstrate how it may operate within the context of humour generation. (shrink)

In Umberto Eco’s classic novel The Name of the Rose, we are introduced to a decidedly Platonic fear of laughter. According to the blind librarian Jorge de Burgos, “[l]aughter is weakness, corruption, the foolishness of our flesh. It is the peasant’s entertainment, the drunkard’s license;... laughter remains base, a defense for the simple, a mystery desecrated for the plebeians.”1 Laughter could not accompany insight or clarity or revelation. By destroying the last known copy of the second part of Aristotle’s Poetics, (...) which delves into comedy after the already-familiar investigation of tragedy, de Burgos hopes to undermine any argument that claims to find significance in comic content. Indeed, the central plot of... (shrink)

The article deals with Kierkegaard's conception of the comic and the role it plays in his thought. The background against which the issue must be tackled is Kierkegaard's critique of modernity: according to Kierkegaard, modernity is characterized by its objectifying tendencies, to which we must oppose the rediscovery of interiority. These two registers correspond to two different linguistic regimes: objectivity to direct communication, interiority to indirect communication. The latter can express itself in the form of the incongruity that grounds (...) the comic, for example when an interlocutor answers a rhetorical question. Such an answer cannot be apprehended literally (objectively) but only by an internal exercise. In the last part of the article the author highlights the different functions that have irony and humour in Kierkegaard’s conception of the stages of existence. (shrink)

This thesis explores and describes the comic features of Samuel Beckett’s prose works. It explores fundamental questions about Beckett’s humour. On the one hand, it investigates the nature of humour, and, on the other, it investigates what counts as humour in Beckett. This twofold investigation requires ‘attuning’ philosophy and literary criticism, where questions and tools of each discipline mutually sharpen and refine each other. Chapter 1 evaluates philosophical accounts of humour and identifies Incongruity Theory as the theory offering the (...) best account of humour. According to this theory, a necessary and not sufficient condition for comic amusement is the perception of an incongruity. Chapter 2 starts exploring what counts as humour in Beckett by examining where comic incongruities are located. By doing so, this chapter puts the Incongruity Theory to the test, and, evaluates the analytical tools ordinarily used in describing humour. This exploration uses Ruby Cohn’s seminal description of Beckett’s humour as a springboard. This chapter individuates a comic layer which Cohn’s description has overlooked – the ‘comic of language acts’. Chapter 3 analyses Beckett’s texts in order to describe the comic devices that depend on the performance of language acts. In order to do so, the discussion makes use of Austin’s Theory of Speech Acts. As a result, this chapter develops a set of tools able to capture ‘the comic of language acts’, a comic layer which crucially shapes Beckett’s writing. Chapter 4 demonstrates how to make use of the set of tools developed in Chapter 3 by examining three key works of Beckett – More Pricks than Kicks, Watt, and Molloy. This examination leads to the individuation of three movements at the level of illocutionary acts – ‘twists’, ‘convolutions’, and ‘oscillations’ – which are informative of Beckett’s writing and of the experience of reading these works. (shrink)

This essay aims to explore the ways in which a philosophical account of humor can contribute to the explanation of the application of humor in the course of everyday day life. After providing a conceptual analysis of comic amusement ‐‐ the psychological state that takes humor as it's object ‐‐ and defending the thesis that it is an emotion, I will go on to show how this emotion functions productively in various situations in terms of the non‐exhaustive and non‐exclusive (...) categories of bonding, coping, and perspectival modification (or frame changing). I will not, however, discuss the frequent claims that humor contributes to health because the evidence for this claim is highly contested. (shrink)

This chapter discusses the comic potential that originates in the way players of digital games take on the dual position of being at once a played self that is internal to the gameworld and a playing self that perceives this world from the outside. I first describe the comic attitude as it is defined within philosophy: as an attitude of distanced and dispassionate reflection towards an incongruity. I then show how the dual position of players during gameplay not (...) only is characterized by incongruities, such as contradictions between the apparent seriousness and the ultimate triviality of in-game actions, but also allows players to dispassionately reflect on these incongruities. I thus argue that digital gameplay entails the inherent possibility of turning players into both a comic object and a laughing subject. (shrink)

The lack of stage directions in surviving Greek comedy which might give a clue to comic ‘business’ not clearly signalled or confirmed in the text is a considerable disadvantage to us, not least in some of the opening tableaux of Aristophanes. One thinks of restless father and snoring son in bed at the opening ofClouds, the jokes involving the incongruous entry of master, slave, donkey and baggage inFrogs, the preparations for launching the dung-beetle into space inPeace– all scenes which (...) demand visual as well as verbal effects in order to engage immediate attention and get the audience into a lively humour for what is to come. In the opening scene ofWaspsbetween the slaves engaged in their nocturnal vigil over Philocleon, there are a number of points implied by the verbal references which seem to me to depend for clarification on their actions, and perhaps also the stage properties involved. (shrink)

In this chapter, we treat Larry David’s television series, Curb Your Enthusiasm as, in large measure, a philosophical exercise. We argue that it presents a critique of our norms, practices, and conventions of social behavior, notably those that pertain primarily to civility rather than to morality. This critique identifies certain essential features of such behavior including: the typical unspoken-ness of its governing norms, and their non-necessity, despite appearances to the contrary, due to our intense emotional investment in them. In Curb (...) Your Enthusiasm, the ostensible justification that “This is just how we do things” comes in for merciless, satirical interrogation, most often by Larry David but sometimes by others, at Larry David’s expense. This chapter relies heavily on Mary Douglas’s discussion of jokes, but parts company with it in crucial respects. The chapter will also situate Larry David’s brand of humor in the context of the philosophy of comic amusement in terms of the notion of incongruity. Special emphasis will be played on the importance Larry David assigns to emotions in the maintenance of the relevant social norms. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Slipping on Banana Peels, Tumbling into WellsPhilosophy and ComedyPaul A. Kottman (bio)Alenka Zupančič. The Odd One In: On Comedy. Cambridge, MA: MIT P, 2008.[T]he philosopher... is the jest, not only of Thracian handmaids but of the general herd, tumbling into wells and every sort of disaster through his inexperience [hupo apeirias].—Plato, Theaetetus 174cWhy stop philosophy’s most precious intrinsic comedy when it comes to comedy?—Alenka Zupančič, The Odd One In1“Comedy,” (...) writes Alenka Zupančič in The Odd One In, “draws our attention to the fact that something of our life lives on its own as we speak, that is to say, at any moment of our life” [218]. Reelaborating some of Jacques Lacan’s formulations regarding comedy, drive, and desire, Zupančič clarifies that this “something” is the “Real of human desire”— namely, “the incongruence of the reality of desire and drive with all those (also quite factual) outlines that determine our supposedly realistic reality” [218]. This extrapolation from Lacan frames Zupančič’s views on comedy and its subversive character; but it is her unique engagement with G. W. F. Hegel’s remarks on comedy—particularly the sections of the Phenomenology of Spirit in which Hegel tracks the passage from the Comedy of Aristophanes to Christianity—that give a distinctive arc to Zupančič’s highly original and generative approach to comedy and its subversive character. In this review essay, I will draw attention to some of the most original aspects of this critical appropriation of Hegel, while highlighting key elements of the text’s argumentative trajectory. Toward the end of this essay, I will also suggest ways that Hegel’s speculative remarks, which see the comic figure as symptomatic of a community that is not yet conscious of itself as such, might allow us to put into question some of Zupančič’s central claims regarding the subversive nature of both comedy and her own critical intervention.Zupančič’s reflections on comedy—which are not only innovative, but also delightfully readable—merit, in their own right, the attention of anyone interested in the intersection of literature, philosophy, and contemporary culture; but her text is all the more significant in light of the oft-remarked rarity of sustained philosophical reflections on comedy. Although there are a number of books on comedy as a literary genre, philosophical studies of comedy are surprisingly rare.1 Henri Bergson’s Le rire (published in 1900) [End Page 3] is perhaps the most well known. More recently, Simon Critchley has written about laughter, wit, and jokes in On Humour. Perhaps the most comprehensive philosophical account of comedy to date—Agnes Heller’s Immortal Comedy: The Comic Phenomenon in Art, Literature and Life (2005)—was published only three years before The Odd One In.2In contrast to Heller’s work, which offers a philosophical account of a variety of comic works and genres, and unlike these other earlier studies, which deal with the poetics of comedy and related phenomena such as laughter or jokes, Zupančič does not approach comedy as an object of inquiry that might be analyzed by philosophical categories or methods, nor even as a phenomenon that is extrinsic to philosophy. Instead, she sees comedy and philosophy as intrinsic to one another, such that the fate of philosophical activity is tied to the fate of the comical. In assessing Zupančič’s claims, therefore, I will strive less for a summary catalogue of the claims presented in the book than for a reelaboration of what I take to be her most provocative and important assertions regarding what she calls the “critical edge” shared by both philosophy and comedy [Zupančič 9].The Odd One In is the eighth title in the series Short Circuits, edited by Slavoj Žižek, in relation to whose writings Zupančič’s text clearly stands in intellectual and stylistic propinquity. (Žižek himself might be taken as a prime figure in whom comic and philosophical practices, in Zupančič’s sense, coincide.) The book opens and closes with a reminder that we too often mistake the subversive side of comedy for “a consolation... (shrink)

_Jokes, Life after Death, and God _has two main tasks: to try to understand exactly what a joke is, and to see whether there are any connections between jokes, on the one hand, and life after death and God, on the other hand. But it pursues other tasks as well, tasks of an ancillary sort. This book devises a general and comprehensive, but brief, theory of jokes. The author begins with critiques of other writers’ views on the subject. 1) Ted (...) Cohen thinks that such a theory is impossible. 2) Ronald Berk, on the other hand, provides just such a theory. And 3) John Morreall provides a general theory of laughter, which may include some things which can be used in a general theory of jokes. 4) Neil Schaeffer, too, provides a general theory of laughter, which makes a big point out of what he calls the “ludicrous context”; but he does include a chapter on jokes. 5) Christopher Wilson offers a general theory of jokes in which he focuses on form and content. And 6) Thomas Werge, in reflecting on the comic, suggests a general theory of jokes which identifies their matter, form, agents, purposes, and beyond these, the underlying shared relational context, which makes it possible for jokes to arise. 7) Bill Fuller’s message is that there is more funniness coming out of two or more heads than out of one, just as Socrates’ message was that there is more clarity coming out of two or more heads than out of one. 8) Umberto Eco feels that monks should laugh, just as ordinary people do; for laughter not only refreshes our seeking spirits, it also illuminates the truth we seek. 9) Simon Critchley, in his reflections on humor, notes that jokes bring on a kind of everyday anamnesis, that they are anti-story stories, that they are like prayers, that they are like philosophy; and that they require a certain underlying context, which is implicitly recognized by both teller and listener, and which renders possible the tension needed to make the punch line work. 10) Martha Wolfenstein, pursuing a psychological analysis of children’s humor, proposes that the underlying motive for telling jokes remains the same from childhood to adulthood, i.e., to transform painful and frustrating experiences so as to extract pleasure from them; and that the agent or productive cause of jokes is the repressing unconscious, as suggested by Freud. As John Morreall has argued, neither the Superiority Theory, nor the Relief Theory, nor the Incongruity Theory appears to work as a general and comprehensive theory. Moreover, these writers talk more about humor and laughter than about jokes. To be sure, a joke is a type of humor. Thus, to say something about humor is to say something, though of a generic sort, about jokes. Similarly, to say something about the laughter caused by humor is to say something, though generic, about the laughter caused by jokes. Most of the authors considered in chapter one are concerned with jokes, and not only with humor as such. Section 11 of chapter one puts together, out of the combined contributions of these authors, what can be considered the beginnings of, some thoughts toward, a general and comprehensive theory of jokes. This task the author illustrates in a concrete way, by looking at individual jokes of different sorts; not, however, without inviting the reader to enjoy these jokes. The author looks particularly at Jewish jokes, Christian jokes, and Islamic jokes, jokes about philosophy and philosophers, yo mama jokes, Italian jokes and Slovak jokes, all of which makes for a clearer understanding of exactly what a joke is. The analysis of general theory is then followed by some views on the morality of jokes and joke-telling, and an analysis of the connection between jokes and life after death, on the one hand, and God, on the other. Throughout the book Bobik offers innumerable examples to heighten our understanding and entertain us. (shrink)

Le rire est un phénomène qui touche aussi bien le corps que l’âme de l’homme. Helmuth Plessner l’interprète comme le signe d’une existence contradictoire propre à la condition humaine, une existence à la frontière, marquée par l’ambivalence de la relation corps-âme. Quant au comique, un des déclencheurs principaux du rire, la plupart des philosophes le décrivent aussi comme l’apparition d’une contradiction et d’une incongruité. Dans l’histoire de la théologie, le rire a souvent été critiqué ou même interdit. Par contre, le (...) Moyen-Age connaît une culture du comique et même une valorisation théologique du rire. Le rire du chrétien ne peut-il être compris comme expression de son existence contradictoire de pécheur et de justifié ? Placé « à l’extérieur de lui-même », en tant que pécheur gracié, le chrétien est désormais capable de rire. Laughter is a phenomenon that affects man’s body as well as his soul. Helmuth Plessner interprets it as the sign of the contradictory existence which is peculiar to the human condition, a border existence, marked by the ambivalence of the body-soul relationship. The person who is most successful in triggering laughter is the comic; most philosophers describe him also as the appearance of contradiction and incongruity. In the history of theology laughter has often been criticized or even forbidden. In the Middle Ages, however, there was a culture of the jester and even a theological esteem of laughter. Could not the Christian’s laughter be understood as the expression of his contradictory existence of being sinner and justified? Placed « outside himself » as a sinner who has been pardoned, the Christian is henceforth able to laugh. (shrink)

To what extent can humorism be a legitimate disposition toward the Absurd? The Absurd is born from the insurmountable contradiction between one’s ceaseless striving and the absence of an ultimate resolution – or, as I prefer to call it, the ‘dissolution of resolution’. Humoristic Absurdism is the commitment to a pattern of humorous responses to the Absurd, which regard this absurd condition, as well as its manifestation in absurd situations, as a comical phenomenon. Although the humoristic disposition seems promising, by (...) virtue of humor’s recognition of incongruity and its denial of an ultimate resolution, and succeeds in countering three major objections, it falls prey to the claim that comprehensive humorism portrays as frivolous what is earnest, thereby renouncing the gravity of the desire for ultimate resolution, which is fundamental to the notion of the Absurd. In an attempt to explore alternative roles for humor in a legitimate disposition toward the Absurd, Metamodern Absurdism is suggested, which revolves around a post-ironic oscillation between humor and earnestness. In short, only in a role limited to one pole of an oscillatory pattern of responses can humor be integrated in a legitimate disposition toward the Absurd. (shrink)

The two slaves, Xanthias and Sosias, posted by their master's son to guard his ‘sick’ father Philocleon, challenge the audience to guess the nature of the mysterious and strange disease &nuó&sgr&ogr&nu &lambda&lambdaó&kappa&ogr&tau&ogr&nu, 71) on account of which the father must be kept inside the house. When the correct answer to the riddle is finally disclosed, Philocleon is revealed to beis revealed to be φιληλιαστσ , namely a man ‘who loves to be a juror’ and to spend his days in the (...) law-courts passionately pursuing the infatuation of which his son tries to cure him by locking him up away from the law-courts and from his fellow jurors. The joke owes its comic effect to incongruity, termed the ‘humour of inappropriateness’ by MacDowell, who writes: ‘It is funny when addiction to being a juror is called a disease , because “disease” is a word which is not generally applied to such conditions’. It should, however, be stressed that in order to create this sense of incongruity the previously mentioned diseases must form a class with certain common characteristics fundamentally different from those of Philocleon's, thus gradually moulding the audience's expectations and channelling them in a completely different direction. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Humnor, Anarchy, and Aggression The Superiority Theory: Humor as Anti‐social The Incongruity Theory: Humor as Irrational The Relief Theory: Humor as a Pressure Valve The Minority Opinion of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas: Humor as Playful Relaxation The Relaxation Theory of Robert Latta.

This chapter contains sections titled: What Was First Funny? The Basic Pattern in Humor: The Playful Enjoyment of a Cognitive Shift Is Expressed in Laughter The Worth of Mirth.

This chapter contains sections titled: Humor as Aesthetic Experience Humor and Other Ways of Enjoying Cognitive Shifts: The Funny, Tragic, Grotesque, Macabre, Horrible, Bizarre, and Fantastic Tragedy vs. Comedy: Is Heavy Better than Light? Enough with the Jokes: Spontaneous vs. Prepared Humor.

Comics have great potential to depict an almost infinite range of themes, questions and lives. But what about their ability to express and interpret philosophical concepts? How can we differentiate between the representation of theoretical concepts in and of themselves, and the impact of comics techniques on the legacy of philosophers, their lives and their thought? This book explores the historical and artistic value of representing lives through the medium of bande dessinée (BD), French-language comics. The text analyses three biographical (...) BDs dedicated to the lives of Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and Albert Camus as well as a selection of print and online comics that extend the legacy of these philosophers and their historical movement. The work is the first to analyse biographical BD through the lens of Existentialism, offering a new theory of reading biographical comics. The research not only contributes a novel approach to comics but also an enhanced understanding of Existentialism and the Existentialists, including their enduring contemporary relevance. (shrink)

This study investigated the possible mediation of career distress in the relationship between major incongruence and occupational engagement and whether this mediation depends on the degree of outcome expectation. Moderated mediation analysis was tested on a sample of 346 Korean undergraduate students. The results indicated that career distress mediated the relationship between major incongruence and occupational engagement. Moreover, the negative indirect effect of major incongruence on occupational engagement through career distress weakened as the level of outcome expectation increased. The significant (...) mediation effect of career distress is meaningful given the evidence on the role of emotion in career adaptation. In addition, the significant moderation effect of cognitive evaluation and belief in the mediating relationship on career problem, career emotion, and career behavior is meaningful in that it provides insights in cognitive intervention that could be effective in career counseling. (shrink)

Comics can be ordered in a range of ways, most overtly by issue number for works within a series, and by page number for pages within works. The internal elements of a comic can also be ordered by formal details found within pages. We identify four kinds of formal details specific to comics pages or two-page spreads: how their elements are arranged, how they are viewed, what events they represent, and when information about those events is presented.

Comic Relief: A Comprehensive Philosophy of Humor develops an inclusive theory that integrates psychological, aesthetic, and ethical issues relating to humor Offers an enlightening and accessible foray into the serious business of humor Reveals how standard theories of humor fail to explain its true nature and actually support traditional prejudices against humor as being antisocial, irrational, and foolish Argues that humor’s benefits overlap significantly with those of philosophy Includes a foreword by Robert Mankoff, Cartoon Editor of The New Yorker.

This essay is meant to shed light on a discourse that spans centuries and includes different voices. To be aware of such trans-textual resonances can add a level of historical understanding to the reading of philosophical texts. Specifically, we intend to demonstrate how the notion of the ineffable Dao 道, prominently expressed in the Daodejing 道德經, informs a long discourse on incongruent names in distinction to a mainstream paradigm that demands congruity between names and what they designate. Thereby, we trace (...) the development of the idea of the ineffable Dao quite differently from modern mystical interpretations. We show how, in an early Chinese context, it first gives rise to a sociopolitical critique of the incongruity underlying socially constructed names in the Zhuangzi 莊子, then to a discourse on the incongruity between moral virtues and names in Xuanxue 玄學 philosophy, and eventually to Sengzhao’s 僧肇 claim that a perceived congruence of names with things does not entail actual congruence between names and reality. (shrink)

Visual narratives like comics involve a range of complex cognitive operations in order to be understood. The Parallel Interfacing Narrative‐Semantics (PINS) Model integrates an emerging literature showing that comprehension of wordless image sequences balances two representational levels of semantic and narrative structure. The neurocognitive mechanisms that guide these processes are argued to overlap with other domains, such as language and music.

Comics are complex multimodal documents that make for intriguing materials to analyze with computer vision and computational linguistics. This review summarizes the growing developments in computational modeling which have been progressing to analyze visual narratives across their various substructures.

Attention is automatically allocated to stimuli that are opposite in valence to the current motivational focus (Rothermund, 2003; Rothermund, Voss, & Wentura, 2008). We tested whether this incongruency effect is due to affective–motivational counter-regulation or to an increased salience of stimuli that mismatch with cognitively activated information. Affective processing biases were assessed with a search task in which participants had to detect the spatial position at which a positive or negative stimulus was presented. In the motivational condition, positive or negative (...) affective–motivational states were induced by performance feedback after each trial. In the cognitive activation condition, participants memorised the word “good” or “bad” during the search task. The affective incongruency effect was replicated in the motivational condition, whereas an affective congruency effect obtained in the cognitive activation condition. These findings support an explanation of affective incongruency effects in terms of automatic counter-regulation that is motivational in nature. (shrink)

A history of the comic has not yet been written. According to historians, the comic had very different, and sometimes even opposite causes, in relation to different ages and cultures. What provoked laughter in one civilization could be taken quite seriously in another. The comic has always had a particular function and its nature, its internal composition, has not been immutable. It could be kept within the limits of a single sphere that was assigned to it in (...) particular (the comic, as opposed to the tragic), but it could also be elevated to a conceptual vision of the world, and in this case, it embraced much more universal domains of human history. Nevertheless, nothing has been written on the history of the comic throughout all ages and encompassing all peoples. Serious studies concerning the place it occupies in the history of civilizations are, however, of great interest. (shrink)

In the first part of this paper, I will briefly introduce the concept of incongruity and its relation to humor and seriousness, connecting the ideas of Arthur Schopenhauer and the contemporary work of John Morreall. I will reveal some of the relations between Schopenhauer's notion of "seriousness" and the existentialists such as Jean Paul Sartre, Simone Be Beauvoir, and Lewis Gordon. In section II, I will consider the relationship between playfulness and incongruity, noting the role that enjoyment of incongruity plays (...) in creative, non-dogmatic thinking. In section III, I will critique Morreall's arguments against the efficacy of humor as a means of serious protest, analyzing the complex relationship between the ambiguous terms "seriousness" and "playfulness". In the final section, I contend that Morreall's conception of humor, with which I generally agree, fails to adequately address subversive humor. He is cognizant of the benefits of a humorous attitude and of the work of rebellious groups who use humor, but his insistence that the play mode of humor precludes emotional attachment and practical concern, renders his philosophical analysis of humor far less comprehensive than his title suggests. I will make the case, contra Morreall, and he is the most prominent of many humor theorists who make similar points, that some humor in play mode is non-existentially, non-gravely serious, and intends to do more than simply "delight" audiences; the subversive humorist, in particular, is attempting to disclose and transmit information in such a way as to create change in both attitudes and practical social interactions. (shrink)

This article aims to review the last three decades of the comic Spain. The study is evaluating the evolution of the comics industry, from its beginnings during the dictatorship and its expansion with the advent of democracy until the present times of difficulties and changes. The rise of the comic can be seen in its growing importance within the press, the acceptance of a public that matures over time and especially in the sales of an industry that has (...) to adapt to new situations. (shrink)

Two puzzles with regard to the Kritik der reinen Vernunft are incongruent counterparts and causality. In De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis, Kant indicates that the experience of things like left and right hands, so-called incongruent counterparts, involve certain pure intuitions, and hence constitute one line of evidence for the claim that the concept of space itself is a pure intuition. In KrV, Kant again argues that the concept of space itself is a pure intuition, but does not (...) cite the experience of incongruent counterparts as evidence for this claim. Since there is ostensibly nothing in KrV which tells against the existence of the experiences of incongruent counterparts, the natural question is: “Why, in KrV, does Kant not cite the experience of incongruent counterparts as evidence for the claim that the concept of space is a pure intuition?” The problem with causality is as follows. One of the most primary and basic claims of KrV is that empirical experience is structured by non-empirical concepts, such as substantiality and causality. In a portion of KrV entitled the Transcendental Deduction, Kant gives section 20 the heading “All sensible intuitions stand under the categories, as conditions under which alone their the manifold can come together in one consciousness”. Since categories are those concepts which structure empirical experience, section 20 has demonstrated that all sensible intuitions are subject to substantiality and causality. However, there is a later portion of KrV entitled the Second Analogy with the heading “Principle of temporal sequence according to the law of causality: All alterations occur in accordance with the law of the connection of cause and effect”. Thus, the natural question is: “What does the Second Analogy demonstrate about causality which the Transcendental Deduction did not already demonstrate about causality?”. (shrink)

Kant's argument from incongruent counterparts for substantival space is examined; it is concluded that the argument has no force against a relationist. The argument does suggest that a relationist cannot give an account of enantiomorphism, incongruent counterparts and orientability. The prospects for a relationist account of these notions are assessed, and it is found that they are good provided the relationist is some kind of modal relationist. An illustration and interpretation of these modal commitments is given.

Not all comics are art. What about the comics that are art? What sort of art are they? In particular, are comics a form of literature? For a variety of reasons it is tempting to think that at least some comics are literature. Nevertheless, many theorists reject the ‘comics as literature’ view. And although some reasons for resisting that view are misguided, I shall argue that there are other good reasons for being hesitant about treating comics as a form of (...) literature. This leaves us at an impasse with respect to the classification of comics. I suggest that the way out of the impasse is to recognize that comics are a hybrid art form. (shrink)

This paper considers further evidence that five comic poets as opposed to three competed at the Lenaia and City Dionysia festivals in Athens during the Peloponnesian War. Aristophanes’ abuse of his comic rivals Phrynichos, Ameipsias and Lykis in the opening scene ofFrogs, produced at the Lenaia of 405, is interpreted as a response to his immediate competitors at the dramatic contest that year. A survey of the evidence elsewhere in comedy suggests that comic poets usually reserved such (...) attacks on rival poets for occasions when all were in direct competition at the same festival. Further analysis of Aristophanes’ competitive strategies also suggests these poets immediate participation in the festival and therefore that five poets competed at the Lenaia that year. (shrink)

Comic moralism holds that some moral properties impact negatively on the funniness of certain items that possess them. Strong versions of the doctrine deem the impact to be devastating: the possession of such a property by one of these items ensures the item is not funny. Weak versions deem the impact merely damaging: any funniness one of the items possesses is diminished, but not destroyed, by its possession of the property. Various species of comic moralism hold, respectively, various (...) moral properties to impact negatively on funniness. For example, one species holds as much of the property “manifests attitudes that are morally wrong,” but other species hold as much of different moral properties. Comic moralism, or a species of it, can be unrestricted, or restricted, depending on whether it pertains to all the items that possess the negatively impacting moral property or properties, or to just a subset of these items. (shrink)

We argue that the counterfactual representations of popular culture, like their religious cognates, are shaped by cognitive constraints that become visible when considered in aggregate. In particular, we argue that comic-book literature embodies core intuitions about sociality and its maintenance that are activated by the cognitive problem of living in large groups. This leads to four predictions: comic-book enforcers should be punitively prosocial, be quasi-omniscient, exhibit kin-signalling proxies and be minimally counterintuitive. We gauge these predictions against a large (...) sample of 19,877 characters that were derived from 72,611 comics using data scraping techniques. Our results corroborate the view that cognitive constraints exercise a selective effect on the transmission of popular culture. (shrink)