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Mar 02, 2025
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ANTH 188 - Special Topics: Anthropology of HumorSemester Hours: 3
Humor is a fundamental form of creative human communication and expressive culture that anthropologists have encountered in diverse cultures globally. Ethnographic research provides this course’s focus on varied forms of humor cross culturally—from joking behavior and verbal dueling to mythological characters and stories as well as satire and caricature and “ritual play” and performance, including contemporary sitcoms. To examine the roles of humor in the lives of people, particular attention encompasses the specific context of a culture in order to explain how humor affects people’s lives and humor’s meaning to them. Humor’s communicative and expressive functions are explored in examining a range of topics from politics and resistance to class, race and gender to values and religious belief. The contribution of anthropology to an interdisciplinary body of scholarly ideas about humor, laughter, and the comic will emerge from this study, and students will undertake short projects on in the United States or another culture of their choice. This year the instructor will focus on humor traditions among Native Americans (Apache), Japan and Africa. A trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (exhibit on satire and caricature) and possibly to a comedy club are planned.
Prerequisite(s) & Course Notes:
Open to students who have completed at least 6 semester hours in anthropology and/or related social sciences. May be repeated when topics vary.
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