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Made-in-Canada Humour
Literary, folk and popular culture
Made-in-Canada-Humour is an interdisciplinary survey and analysis of Canadian humour and humorists in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The book focuses on a variety of genres. It includes celebrated Canadian writers and poets with ironic and satiric perspectives; oral storytellers of tall tales in the country and the city; newspaper print humorists; representative national and regional cartoonists; and comedians of stage, radio and television. The humour gives voice to Canadian values and experiences, and consequently, techniques and styles of humour particular to the country. While a persistent comic theme has been joking at the expense of the United States, both countries have influenced one another’s humour. Canada’s unique humorous tradition also reflects its emergence from a colonial country to a postcolonial and postmodern nation with contemporary humour that addresses gender and racial issues.
[Topics in Humor Research, 3] 2015. xxi, 300 pp.
Publishing status: Available
Published online on 11 September 2015
Published online on 11 September 2015
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
- Acknowledgements | pp. ix–9
- List of illustrations | pp. xi–xii
- Foreword | pp. xiii–xxi
- 1. Antique humour: New Eden dreamers and Sam Slick | pp. 1–36
- 2. Canada’s remarkable humorist Stephen Leacock (1869–1944): Bridging Uncle Sam and Mother England | pp. 37–76
- 3. Folk humour in the country and in the city: The Side Hill Gouger and other myths | pp. 77–110
- 4. 20th century literary humour: Protest and resistance | pp. 111–162
- 5. 20th century print humour and cartoons: Amusing the people and provoking the politicians | pp. 163–208
- 6. Joking at the margins: Ethnicity, race and gender | pp. 209–240
- 7. Popular comedy on stage and in the media: Towards a continental humour | pp. 241–274
- Conclusion | pp. 275–276
- Previous publications | p. 277
- Index | pp. 293–300
“At once erudite and playful, broad and deep, Made-in-Canada Humour explores its twin subjects — humour and Canadian identity — with enormous wit and wisdom and along the way profoundly illuminates both of these perennially fascinating topics, underscoring the great value of juxtaposing them. Interdisciplinary in the best sense of the term, this book offers both cultural history and close analysis of a wide range of cultural texts, elite and popular, written, oral, visual. Authoritative, the work of a lifetime of scholarship, Made-in-Canada Humour is a must-read for anyone who aspires to a serious appreciation of either humour or Canada, or both.””
Tamara Palmer Seiler, University of Calgary
“Beverly Rasporich has written an extraordinary, incisive, sophisticated and witty book about Canadian humour and culture. Beautifully written and containing sharp insights, the book takes readers on a journey through a complex cultural landscape. In Canada, irony, satire, parody and laughter were the products of a vast and sometimes impenetrable geography, the cut and thrust of political protest, immigrant experiences, a deeply gendered society, the inescapable presence of the United States as well as harsh regional and linguistic differences. In explaining so much of Canadian history and culture so well, Rasporich has given us a valuable and fantastic gift. This book is a must read for those who are interested in how humour both defines and to some degree creates a country.”
David Taras, Mount Royal University, Calgary
“Made-in-Canada Humour is a journey through space and time in Canadian humour. Rasporich, Arts Professor at the University of Calgary, masterly creates a general picture of Canadian humour culture, thus revealing its particularities. [...] The strong point of the research lies in the large amount of examples provided, thus becoming a useful tool for scholars who study Canadian humour in particular, but also for those who want to understand better the Canadian culture.”
Ioana Ciurezu, Transilvania University of Braşov, in European Journal of Humour Research 5 (1) 91–94
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