“This is not a political party, this is Facebook!”: Political jokes and political (mis)trust in crisis-ridden Greece

Tsakona, Villy

doi:10.7592/ejhr2017.5.4.tsakona

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 29 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…None of the emails received was excluded from the collection and, at the same time, no other material was added by the author (e.g. downloaded from websites or coming from printed collections; see also Tsakona 2015Tsakona , 2017aTsakona , 2017bTsakona , 2018aTsakona , 2018bTsakona , 2020aTsakona : 33-48, 2020c.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scrutinising intertextuality in humour: moving beyond cultural literacy and towards critical literacy

Tsakona

2020

EJHR

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Humourists often resort to previous texts to create their jokes, thus establishing intertextual links between them. Consequently, the processing of such jokes presupposes specific cultural literacy skills which enable speakers to recognise the allusions and interpret them in the new humorous contexts. It has, however, been suggested that speakers’ emphasis on cultural literacy skills for processing allusions and humour may discourage or even impede them from adopting a critical perspective on humorous texts and the allusions included therein. The present study explores this interplay among intertextuality, cultural literacy, critical literacy, and humour in order to underscore the need for critical approaches to humorous texts and intertextuality. It critically analyses political jokes to demonstrate how the intertextual references contributing to their humorous effect create three sets of opposing groups: (a) those who create/tell the jokes vs. those who are targeted by them; (b) the ‘culturally literate’ who employ and understand the intertextual references vs. the ‘culturally illiterate’ who cannot and/or do not do that; and (c) those who agree vs. those who disagree with the ideological presuppositions of the humorous allusions and texts at hand. Based on incongruity and superiority theories of humour, the proposed analysis intends to argue, and pave the way, for more critical perspectives on humorous genres, whether outside or inside educational settings. Such perspectives could sensitise speakers to the fact that humour and intertextuality divide them into opposing groups such as the above-mentioned ones.

show abstract

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scrutinising intertextuality in humour: moving beyond cultural literacy and towards critical literacy

Tsakona

2020

EJHR

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Exploring Attitudinal Meaning in Iranian Political Humor Targets as Distributed Through Social Networks

Jalilifar,

Savaedi

2024

The Language of Politics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Dear friends, traitors and filthy dogs

Vasilaki

2020

JLAC

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A growing line of research focuses on users’ discussions on social networking sites regarding the causes and consequences of the Greek crisis, as well as on online impoliteness in polarised political debates. Following this trend, I set out to examine how vocatives meant to address non-present interactants (such as politicians or collectivised others) are employed by Greek Facebook and YouTube users to delegitimate their perceived political opponents and attribute blame for the country’s problematic politico-economic situation. I am focusing both on standardly impolite vocatives (personalised negative vocatives) and on superficially polite vocatives (vocatives of mock-endearment and mock-deference), examining their structure and purpose in comments discussing the critical period of the 2015 Greek referendum and subsequent elections. Findings suggest that users exploit norms of standardised politeness and cultural expectations within the Greek interactional context to denigrate their political opponents. Additionally, capitalising on salient discourses on the Greek crisis and on the Greek historical past, on the political content of their discussions, and on the affordances of social media, they take advantage of taboo themes typically associated with impoliteness to name the culprits behind the troublesome everyday Greek reality.

show abstract

“This is not a political party, this is Facebook!”: Political jokes and political (mis)trust in crisis-ridden Greece

Abstract: The present study attempts to combine Raskin's (1985) and Davies' (2011)

Cited by 4 publications

References 29 publications

Scrutinising intertextuality in humour: moving beyond cultural literacy and towards critical literacy

Scrutinising intertextuality in humour: moving beyond cultural literacy and towards critical literacy

Exploring Attitudinal Meaning in Iranian Political Humor Targets as Distributed Through Social Networks

Dear friends, traitors and filthy dogs

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About