Jokes and it's Affect on Society

How does the joke affect society? How does it affect the stand-up comedian? The premise of this thesis is that the comedian goes through transformational change on stage, and so does his or her audience. Humour is the medium, which enables this personal change, which Analytical Psychology termed as the individuation process. The performer uses creativity as a way of examining his Self and social issues. The audience participates in the comedian’s jokes because both share or recognise the same issues. As Andrew Samuels reminds us that the individual’s problems and social issues are closely related (Samuels, 2001: 5). This dissertation argues that the stand-up genre can be seen as a form of psychotherapy both for the comedian and society. In fact the two happen simultaneously, as the audience reflect on the issues mentioned by the comedian in his performance. The psychotherapeutic and deep unconscious revelatory components of the stand-up performance are of paramount importance for the comedian to define himself as an individual and for the audience to engage with the comedian. Individuation is intrinsically linked to society, and this link can be explored through the medium of comedy. The audience, alongside the man on stage, go through the four stages of the therapeutic process as defined by Jung: confession, elucidation, education and transformation (Jung CW16: para. 55).

Each stand-up comedian has his own perspective on the world, which must have the capacity to resonate with the audience. In their performances, comedians demonstrate their ability to interpret the world through the uniqueness of their own experience. Their personal lives become the foil for their analysis and criticism of society. They use storytelling methods and are raconteurs who manage to draw the audience into their creative aura. The intensity of this complex interaction, which involves a web of projections and introjections between the performer as the stand-up comedian and the outside world means that there are various therapeutic processes being activated.

This dissertation is an attempt to deconstruct and define the psychological exchanges between the three participants of this interaction, the Stand-up, the audience and the comedy club, as the ‘vas,’ or the ‘Third Space’. Although our primary interest is the comedian’s own personal transformation, the audience’s reaction to comedy and the reaction of the outside world are vital as they act and interact one upon the other. Particularly important is the recent upsurge of interest in comedy because it is a genre, which reflects the individual’s struggle with the collective. Comedy debates the issue of individual identity in our times of globalisation, mass production, corporate structures and the patriarchal hierarchical reconstruction and a shift towards integrating matriarchal values.