In Spite of Yourself: The Asignifying Force of Humor and Laughter calls upon the interruptive moments of uncontrollable laughter to challenge rhetorics historical treatment of humor and laughter. Anyone who has ever suffered a fit of hysterical laughter at precisely the wrong moment, or has begun to laugh spontaneously at an inappropriate joke before stopping short, can attest to laughters uniquely uncontrollable force. Beyond all reason and control, laughter interrupts us and reminds us of the limits of the human subject. Because laughter does not signify meaning in the traditional communicative sense, it exerts an asignifying force irreducible to the questions of truth, understanding, and presence. While rhetoricians like Aristotle, Cicero and Quintilian attempt to confine laughters force to calculated aspects of persuasion, their approaches simultaneously reveal an understanding that laughters effects lie beyond the rational control of the orator. By tracing the often-unintended effects of humor through a range of comedic performances including stand-up comedy, radio, and film, this project ultimately argues that laughters rhetorical power resides not in what it means, but in what it does. Ultimately, because laughter is not a signifying language, yet it still produces rhetorical effects, taking up laughters asignifying force provides a chance to expand the field of rhetoric in ways beyond the reason, beyond signification, and beyond the human.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LSU/oai:etd.lsu.edu:etd-07082013-143714 |
| Date | 12 July 2013 |
| Creators | Casper, Kevin Michael |
| Contributors | Rollins, Brooke, Weinstein, Susan, Demastes, William, Kooi, Christine |
| Publisher | LSU |
| Source Sets | Louisiana State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lsu.edu/docs/available/etd-07082013-143714/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached herein a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to LSU or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below and in appropriate University policies, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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