Get fulltext from our e-platform
The Dynamics of Interactional Humor
Creating and negotiating humor in everyday encounters
This book deals with the construction of diverse forms of humor in everyday oral, written, and mediatized interactions. It sheds light on the differences and, most importantly, the similarities in the production of interactional humor in face-to-face and various technology-mediated forms of communication, including scripted and non-scripted situations. The chapters analyze humor-related issues in such genres as spontaneous conversations, broadcast dialogues, storytelling, media blogs, bilingual conversations, stand-up comedy, TV documentaries, drama series, family sitcoms, Facebook posts, and internet memes. The individual authors trace how speakers collaboratively circulate, reconstruct, and (re)frame either personal or public accounts of reality, aiming –among other things– to produce and/or reproduce humor. Rather than being “finished” products with a “single” interpretation, humorous texts are thus approached as dynamic communicative events that give rise to diverse interpretations and meanings. The book draws on a variety of up-to-date approaches and methodologies, and will appeal to scholars in discourse analysis, conversation analysis, interactional sociolinguistics, pragmatics, ethnography of communication, and social semiotics.
[Topics in Humor Research, 7] 2018. vi, 316 pp.
Publishing status: Available
Published online on 5 January 2018
Published online on 5 January 2018
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
- Chapter 1. Investigating the dynamics of humor: Towards a theory of interactional humorJan Chovanec and Villy Tsakona | pp. 1–26
- Part 1. Designing humor in oral interactions
- Chapter 2. Reactions to jab lines in conversational storytellingRania Karachaliou and Argiris Archakis | pp. 29–56
- Chapter 3. Discourse markers as guides to understanding spontaneous humor and ironyKsenia Shilikhina | pp. 57–76
- Chapter 4. The pragmatics of humor in bilingual conversationsMarianthi Georgalidou and Hasan Kaili | pp. 77–104
- Chapter 5. Laughing at you or laughing with you? Humor negotiation in intercultural stand-up comedyMargherita Dore | pp. 105–126
- Chapter 6. Teasing as audience engagement: Setting up the unexpected during television comedy monologuesSarah Seewoester Cain | pp. 127–152
- Part 2. Designing humor in mediated interactions
- Chapter 7. Laughter and non-humorous situations in TV documentariesJan Chovanec | pp. 155–180
- Chapter 8. “Cool children” and “super seniors” cross into youth language: Humorous constructions of youthfulness in Greek family sitcomsTheodora P. Saltidou and Anastasia G. Stamou | pp. 181–204
- Chapter 9. No child’s play: A philosophical pragmatic view of overt pretense as a vehicle for conversational humorMarta Dynel | pp. 205–228
- Chapter 10. Online joint fictionalizationVilly Tsakona | pp. 229–256
- Chapter 11. On-line humorous representations of the 2015 Greek national elections: Acting and interacting about politics on social mediaAnna Piata | pp. 257–282
- Chapter 12. Positive non-humorous effects of humor on the internetFrancisco Yus | pp. 283–304
- List of contributors | pp. 305–310
- Index | pp. 311–316
“A significant contribution to the study of humor performance (as opposed to competence) within a broad interactionist framework. Applications to a variety of genres, contexts, and situations mean that the book will be of interest to most researchers in humor studies.”
Salvatore Attardo, Texas A&M University-Commerce
“By taking seriously the notion of humor as a social practice that is embedded in and inextricable from its sociocultural context, this volume sets the stage for future inquiry into the joint construction of playful communication in face-to-face, as well as mediated, interaction.”
Nancy D. Bell, Washington State University
“Indeed a dynamic collection, this volume presents a view of humor from a number of disparate perspectives. It is a useful and well-balanced collection of pragmatic approaches illuminating the multifaceted nature of humour. The organisation of the volume into oral face-to-face and electronically mediated humorous interactions enables the reader to engage with both the striking similarities but also the differences engendered by the choice of modality. Bringing together philosophical, pragmatic and sociolinguistic approaches to humorous phenomena, while developing theoretical perspectives using case studies, the volume is a worthy contribution to a burgeoning and complex field of enquiry.”
Delia Chiaro, University of Bologna, President of the International Society of Humor Studies
“This collection ambitiously envisions an integrated, dynamic treatment of humorous interactions in diverse contexts, and it contributes significantly to this goal. Must reading for humor scholars.”
Neal R. Norrick, Saarland University
“The volume should be read by humour scholars and even humour producers, as it reunites valuable insights from different theoretical perspectives (pragmatics, sociolinguistics, ethnolinguistics, philosophy, etc.). The well-balanced and coherent construction of the volume highlights the importance of broadening the notion of interaction in humour studies: according to Bakhtin’s dialogic principle, any communicative form, be it written or oral, presupposes an interaction between producer/speaker and receiver/hearer.”
Mihaela-Viorica Constantinescu, University of Bucharest, in Language and Dialogue 10:2 (2020)
Cited by (13)
Cited by 13 other publications
Attardo, Salvatore & Béatrice Priego-Valverde
Bollen, Jonathan
Chen, Rui & Haolan Yan
Constantinescu, Mihaela-Viorica
Linares Bernabéu, Esther
2023. Introduction. In The Pragmatics of Humour in Interactive Contexts [Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 335], ► pp. 1 ff.
Dynel, Marta & Valeria Sinkeviciute
Logi, Lorenzo & Michele Zappavigna
Blin, Lynn
Chovanec, Jan
2018. Irony as counter positioning. In The Pragmatics of Irony and Banter [Linguistic Approaches to Literature, 30], ► pp. 165 ff.
Zawiszová, Halina
[no author supplied]
[no author supplied]
[no author supplied]
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 12 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.