Approaches to Humour and Laughter

Humour is far from straightforward so relevant psychosocial, cultural and political ideas and practices are introduced, as well as humorous typologies and their properties to illustrate its scope. There is a distinct difference between laughter and humour, however much they are associated. Art and humour share a similar concern for understanding or ‘getting it’, which delineates exclusivity through requisite cultural knowledge. Humour research has tended to focus on the positive rather than negative aspects of humour, although there is ambiguity regarding the perception of working-class humour, which is frequently deemed politically incorrect and offensive, hence its exclusion. Humour is a powerful social, cultural and political tool, although there is always a degree of ambiguity regarding meaning or morality and how this functions in practice. Sheri Klein has detailed the types of humour associated with the visual arts, which embrace irony, satire, parody, pun, paradox and dark humour.