Should satire make us laugh? Is satire always funny? Why do we laugh at things anyway? Adam and Jo are joined by Dr Kate Davison (University of Sheffield) to talk about the social history of laughter, and the various satires of the eighteenth-century tavern keeper Ned Ward.

Release date: 13/6/2019

Listen to the Trailer on Soundcloud!

Listen to the full episode on Soundcloud!

In this episode Jo and Adam and Kate talk about:

- Adam’s Funny Game
- Adam Smith (from the eighteenth century)
- Appropriate/Inappropriate laughter
- Brexit
- Charles Dickens
- Disapprobation
- Disease
- Doctor, Doctor Jokes
- Edward (Ned) Ward
- Francisco Garcia
- Francis Hutchinson
- Friday Night Dinner
- Graphic satire from the eighteenth century
- Grub street
- John Dryden
- Incongruity (theory of laughter)
- Laughter
- Laughter as entertainment
- Laughing with/Laughing at
- Long eighteenth century
- Memes
- Print culture
- Puns
- Nish Kumar
- Social communication
- Stewart Lee
- Superiority (theory of laughter)
- Thomas Hobbes
- Vice (dir. by Adam McKay)
- 2EN606: Sick Novels (York St John University, Literature module)

The Index of Laughter used in ‘Adam’s Funny Game’:

No reaction
Sympathetic smile
Polite titter
Genuine titter
Gaffuw
Sustained laughing out loud
Roll on the floor laughing
Laughing in your mind but no physical laughter
Your smiling for no reason because you’re working hard to suppress a laugh
Uncontrollable and inappropriate laughter you are unable to sustain

Next Episode

Satire and Women

Has satire ever really been a “man’s game”? Does satire work differently when written by women? Or when women are the targets? How is sexuality treated by satire? Adam and Jo are joined by Professor Karen Harvey (University of Birmingham) to talk about satire, sex and gender.

Release date: 4/7/2019