ABSTRACT
Aging and death can function as unwelcome reminders of human mortality, and Western cultural history has tended to frame bodily transformations towards death as disgusting. In the context of humor and comedy, disgust has often transformed into ridiculing laughter that has a moralizing effect where mortality is burdened with social stigma. In case of aging and dying, people are loath to accept something they are unable to avoid in themselves, and their fear of mortality can prompt not only disgust, but shame as well.
These affective themes, disgust, fear, and shame are visible in modern stand-up comedy about aging and death. Yet, in many of these cases, the comedy recognizes traditions of disgust, yet self-reflective notions communicate also self-acceptance where disgust becomes redirected towards limiting social norms and expectations. From this perspective, I have analyzed Anglo-American stand-up comedy specials by Ross Bennett, Ricky Gervais, Norm MacDonald, Patton Oswalt, Joan Rivers, Dan Soder, and Wanda Sykes. In all these specials, aging and/or death fuel stories of personal and affective experiences through affective incongruity which aims to reveal contradictions or absurdities in the social construction of affects.
In humor studies, incongruity theory focuses on the rhetorical and cognitive aspects of humor, comedy, and jokes, and it has been criticized for being evaluative, instead of emotional. However, I argue that incongruities in comedy work at the affective level as well, particularly in case of dark jokes in which comedians discuss topics that violate social norms. Affective incongruity refers to three aspects of stand-up comedy: the level of the joke where affective expectations can be violated; the level of embodied comedy performances; and the level of the audience’s embodied reaction (mix of disgust, laughter, and other affects). By performing and listening jokes about potentially disgusting topics - such as aging and death - humorous content becomes more than a cognitive process, it becomes also a deeply felt and embodied experience. I argue that when stand-up comedians laugh at their mortality, they create space for collective experience that might even reduce the (disgusting) social stigma related to aging and death.
