As I started my research about my topic: ethnic humor I really did not have as much background information of what it actually meant. The first thing that came to my mind when I heard about ethnic humor was comedians like George Lopez who focuses a lot of his jokes on the Mexican ethnicity. In addition, thoughts about how people use stereotypes to discriminate a certain group came across my mind as well because some of theses jokes we seek as entertainment. With this in mind, my first thesis statement was are there benefits of racial humor? As I started conducting and gathering up my research I did find a lot of negatives about ethnic humor, but rarely found any as to what are the positives of ethnic humor. Considering this, if I would not change or rearrange my thesis it would had been very difficult to find enough research to inform my audience about ethnic humor.
Out of my options available for me to research I first went to the CSUSM library database. There is where I discovered instead of informing my audience about the positives and negatives of ethnic humor, there was much more information available on how ethnic humor is displayed in today’s world and how does it affect our
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I imaged only finding information based on comedians and how comedians use their ethnicity to create laughters. Instead, they use these ethnic jokes to show pride in their ethnicity since the majority of these stand-up comedians are categorized in the minority ethnicity. Like for instance George Lopez who is Latino and Chris Rock who is an African American. One thing that really surprised me was how ethnic humor can be seen as a “sword” or “shield”depending on its content and who it is intended to. A sword type of joke can be seen as an offensive joke towards a particular ethnic group. While for a shield type joke it can be seen as a joke to express their ethnic
Racism? Racism my fucking ass. This is about protecting OUT COUNTRY from ILLEGALS WHO ARE BRINGING IN CRIMES AND DRUGS INTO OUR COUNTRY. Any country, with any sense would have a stringent immigration law. You're right, there will always be illegals here. The goal is to endeavor to make it difficult for these illegals they enter our country. If these illegals want to come back to the U. S they can do so...
Australian humour is very unique to Australia, and many other cultures find it quite unusual. It can be described as dry, anti-authoritarian, self-mocking, very ironic and as to stretch the boundaries of what is acceptable. Our humour is seen through our use of slang, print cartoons, radio sketches, comedy series’ on television, films, everyday life and in Australian literature. According to the Collins Dictionary and Thesaurus , humour means, “The quality of being funny; the ability to appreciate or express that which is humorous; situations, speech or writings that are humorous”. Due to its unique qualities, it will become apparent that Australian humour is quiet different to that of America and England and other nations. To highlight the importance of humour through the development of Australian identity, five main elements have been identified. These are, the part Australian humour plays in Australian identity, its unique qualities, its integral part in the Australian identity, the role of humour in times of great hardship and other nation’s perceptions of Australian humour. It is through these elements that it will become evident that humour is an important part of the development of the Australian identity.
Don’t Just Stand There is an essay written by Diane Cole. It was first published in 1989 in a New York Times publication. She advises her audience about how to react to prejudice comments and jokes. However, her argument is not credible because she fails to mention vital information that would help to support her argument, and there are too many logical fallacies.
“Morreall argues that, if we want to answer these questions, we shouldn’t focus on whether the joke happens to trade on a stereotype. Instead, he takes the primary problem with some humor to be that it involves disengaging from things with which we ought to be engaged.” (Morreall, 529)
The Iranian Revolution of 1979 had an enormous effect on many Iranians, including those who had immigrated to other places. But not the Dumas family. They were fortunate enough to have immigrated to America before that shift in the government. They were able to experience American hospitality in its truest form. Firoozeh Dumas, a published author of “Funny in Farsi”, wrote about her and her family’s experience in America before that turning point in Iranian history. In her book, she says “We remember the kindness more than ever, knowing that our relatives who immigrated to this country after the Iranian Revolution did not encounter the same America,” (Dumas 19). This quote relates to multiple aspects of Dumas’ life being herself, her relationship with her family, and her family’s relationship with her community.
It was hilarious whenever Fred Sanford of the hit series Sanford and Son used to fake his heart attack saying that famous phrase, “I’m coming Elizabeth” or what about him telling Aunt Ester how ugly she was. No one took that type of comedy to the heart and it was intended to hurt no one. It was all for a laugh. Now in today’s time there are new shows on television such as The Chapelle Show, which is hosted and directed by the comedian Dave Chapelle. The object of this show seems to be how much fun he can make of a different race. Times have changed and so have peoples’ since of humor. People went from the laid-back type sitcoms such as Sanford and Son, The Three Stooges, and The Little Rascals, which are all types of shows that people can watch with their entire family, to shows even adults feel turned away from. Some examples include The Chapelle Show and In Living Color.
.... The cutaway gags that are usually shown are not for the progression of the plot of an episode. Some jokes made about races, like the Asian stereotype mentioned prior, are just included in an episode for the sake of making a joke. It is difficult to claim that the stereotypes portrayed on Family Guy are harmful to the people it makes fun of because the argument of it satirizing something greater will always be a defense. In a paper written by Michael Cundall, a professor from North Carolina Agricultural and State University, stated that “any complaint should be made against the society and not against the joke or the teller” (Cundall). This presents the idea that the ethnic jokes are only harmful because society has set it up to be with the racial stereotypes. The jokes are the product of racism rather than the cause of it therefore it cannot be proven as harmful.
From these comedians, satirical humor expresses some opinions about political acts so people can view them more critically.
For years’ black comedians have been stereotyped by black humor using racial slurs in their jokes to communicate with audience an about the social and political issues in the black communities. Although a diverse audience might catch on to most of the contents in a joke that have black humor, some people in American may take it in a harmful and unintended way to avoid controversy with the audience so people need to understand how to identify what is humorous and what is offensive in racial and ethnic humor. I will attempt to prove that living in such a diverse society with the freedom of speech it does not always mean using the word Nigga is a racist thing to say in comedy.
Racism has been and will always be a problem in this world. Right now in America, prejudice and hatred is still being displayed every single day. This country cannot go a week without another racist incident headlining the news. Police brutality is the spotlighted form of racism these past two years. This is absolutely not the first time police brutality has taken the stage. It is fairly easy to find an article online about racism and police brutality because there is an abundant amount of cases. Racism is alive and a massive problem in America. Satire pieces take a solemn subject like racism and make it easier to converse about. The satirists also help people understand topics by making it simple and easy to understand.
Now that this distinction has been made, the issue of humor in modern and post modern l...
Green, Daniel. "A World Worth Laughing At: Catch-22 and the Humor of Black Humor." Studies
Many believe the purpose and application of these stereotypes further reinforce the standardized conceptions of various groups/communities; claiming,stereotype sitcom characters are Hollywood creations made to attract an audience rather than encompassing a true member of a stereotyped community. Others argue stereotypes ,used in the sitcom format, can be utilized as a method of exposure to the public to build familiarity or support for the community. The exposure would also enable the development of awareness for the group being addressed in the program. The purpose of the use of stereotypes in sitcoms created in the late 90’s through the 2000’s has changed from the sitcoms created in the 70’s through 80’s. Instead of being used as a source of discrimination and comedic relief, stereotypes in modern sitcoms are now employed to display diverse lifestyles to audiences; also to challenge and diversify the current traditional stereotypes. The use of comedy weaved into
Psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists study humor because it is a fundamental culture value, but they still can’t determine why certain things make some people laugh and others not. There are “humor quotient” tests that are designed to measure an individual’s sense of humor, but these tests are questionable. These tests aren’t accurate because almost all humor depends on cultural background knowledge and language skills. Not every person in the whole world, or even in one country share the same background knowledge and skills, therefore they cannot have the same type of humor. “The fact remains that individuals vary in their appreciation of humor” (Rappoport 9). Since humor varies from individual to individual, humor lies in the individual. How successful or funny a joke is depends on how the person receives the joke, humor cannot be measured by a statistical
Humor is more than just amusing entertainment to pass the time. Though jokes and witty banter can be shallow, humor can go deeper than surface level to convey messages to audiences who would otherwise be close-minded about certain ideas. Humor is a great tool to get audiences to change the way they think, feel, and act. In “Saying Goodbye to Yang,” Alexander Weinstein uses humor to criticize some of society’s faults such as the way it has become heavily reliant on technology, racially insensitive, and judgmental.