No Laughing Matter: Visual Humor in Ideas of Race, Nationality, and Ethnicity

362 Pages·2015·10.914 MB·English

by  Angela Rosenthal, David Bindman, Adrian W. B. Randolph

6.125 × 9.25 SPINE: 1 FLAPS: 0
The role of race and ethnicity in global humor rosenthal,
BinDman,
and
ranDolph
“The scholarship in this volume In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo at-
tacks, this collection — which gathers
is superior across the board and a
contributions from scholars in the fields
much-needed contribution to the
of race, ethnicity, and humor — seems
field of race and representation in
especially timely. Inspired by Denmark’s
Western art. Approaching the issues Muhammad cartoons controversy, the
contributors inquire into the role that
of race and stereotype from another
racial and ethnic stereotypes play in vi-
angle, that of humor, these essays
sual humor and the thin line that sepa-
help us expand our thinking about rates broad characterization as a source NO LAUGHING
power, resistance, and ambivalence, of humor from its power to shock or
exploit. The authors not only investigate
complicating already complicated
the ways in which humor is used to de- MATTER
discourse on identity.”
mean or give identity to racial, national,
aDrienne ChilDs
or ethnic groups but also explore how
W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute,
humor works differently in different
Harvard University
media, such as cartoons, photographs,
film, video, television, and physical per-
formance.
angela rosenthal was a professor of art history at Dartmouth College. Adrian
W. B. Randolph is the dean of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at
Northwestern University. David Bindman is emeritus professor of the history of
art at University College London.
Interfaces: Studies in Visual Culture
Dartmouth College Press | Hanover, New Hampshire
Cover detail (inside mouth): Utopian Cannibal.org 2000. Lithography ISBN 978-1-61168-821-4
Dartmouth Visual Humor in Ideas of Race, Nationality, and Ethnicity
with chine-collé and woodcut, by Enrique Chagoya, Hood Museum of
Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire. Purchased through
a gift from Jan Seidler Ramirez, Class of 1973; originally published by
Shark’s Ink, Lyons, Colorado. Cover based on an original design concept
by Sean Boggs, www.cargocollective.com/seanboggs. Angela Rosenthal with DaviD BinDman anD aDrian w. B. ranDolph

No
Laughing
Matter

Interfaces: Studies in Visual Culture
Editors Mark J. Williams and Adrian W. B. Randolph, Dartmouth College
This series, sponsored by Dartmouth College Press, develops and promotes
the study of visual culture from a variety of critical and methodological
perspectives. Its impetus derives from the increasing importance of visual
signs in everyday life, and from the rapid expansion of what are termed
“new media.” The broad cultural and social dynamics attendant to these
developments present new challenges and opportunities across and within
the disciplines. These have resulted in a trans-disciplinary fascination with all
things visual, from “high” to “low,” and from esoteric to popular. This series
brings together approaches to visual culture — broadly conceived — that
assess these dynamics critically and that break new ground in understanding
their effects and implications.
For a complete list of books that are available in the series, visit www.upne.com
Angela Rosenthal, ed., with David Bindman and Adrian W. B. Randolph,
No Laughing Matter: Visual Humor in Ideas of Race, Nationality,
and Ethnicity
Robin Veder, The Living Line: Modern Art and the Economy of Energy
Tanya Sheehan, ed., Photography, History, Difference
Ory Bartal, Postmodern Advertising in Japan: Seduction, Visual Culture,
and the Tokyo Art Directors Club
Ruth E. Iskin, The Poster: Art, Advertising, Design, and Collecting,
1860s–1900s
Heather Warren-Crow, Girlhood and the Plastic Image
Heidi Rae Cooley, Finding Augusta: Habits of Mobility and Governance
in the Digital Era
renée c. hoogland, A Violent Embrace: Art and Aesthetics after Representation
Alessandra Raengo, On the Sleeve of the Visual: Race as Face Value
Frazer Ward, No Innocent Bystanders: Performance Art and Audience
Timothy Scott Barker, Time and the Digital: Connecting Technology,
Aesthetics, and a Process Philosophy of Time
Visual Humor
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Dartmouth College Press
An imprint of University Press of New England
www.upne.com
© 2016 Trustees of Dartmouth College
All rights reserved
For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book,
contact Permissions, University Press of New England,
One Court Street, Suite 250, Lebanon NH 03766;
or visit www.upne.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
No laughing matter (Dartmouth College Press)
No laughing matter: visual humor in ideas of race, national-
ity, and ethnicity / Edited by Angela Rosenthal; With David
Bindman and Adrian W. B. Randolph.
pages cm.) — (Interfaces: Studies in visual culture)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbN 978-1-61168-820-7 (cloth: alk. paper) —
isbN 978-1-61168-821-4 (pbk.: alk. paper)) —
isbN 978-1-61168-822-1 (ebook)
1. Wit and humor in art. 2. Race in art.
3. National characteristics in art. 4. Ethnicity in art.
5. Art and society. I. Rosenthal, Angela, editor. II. Title.
N8212.N6 2015
700.973—dc23 2015006496
Contents
preface | Adrian W. B. Randolph ix
introDuction | No Laughing Matter: Visual Humor
in Practice and Theory | David Bindman xiii
one | Carnivalesque and Grotesque: What Bakhtin’s Laughter Tells Us
about Art and Culture | Kobena Mercer 1
Part 1
encountering humor: racial, national,
anD ethnic stereotypes
two | Bartolomeo Passarotti and “Comic” Images of Black Africans in
Early Modern Italian Art | Paul H. D. Kaplan 23
three | “If You Tickle Us, Do We Not Laugh?”: Stereotypes of Jews in
English Graphic Humor of the Georgian Era | Frank Felsenstein 49
four | James Gillray, Charles James Fox, and the Abolition of the
Slave Trade: Caricature and Displacement in the Debate over Reform |
Katherine Hart 76
five | The Other Within | Allen Hockley 104
six | Material Culture, Slavery, and Governability in Colonial Cuba:
The Humorous Lessons of the Cigarette Marquillas |
Agnes Lugo-Ortiz 118
Part 2
racial humor anD theories of moDern meDia
seven | Fake Nostalgia for the Indian: The Argentinean Fiction of
National Identity in the Comics of Patoruzú | Ana Merino 149
eight | Passing for History: Humor and Early Television Historiography
| Mark Williams 176
nine | Comical Conflations: Racial Identity and the Science of
Photography | Tanya Sheehan 201
Part 3
performative comeDy anD race
ten | Laughter as Performance: Some Eighteenth-Century Examples |
David Bindman 233
eleven | Bittersweet Blackness: Humor and the Assertion of Ethnic
Identity in Eleanor Antin’s Eleanora Antinova | Cherise Smith 242
twelve | Traveling Humor Reimagined: The Comedic Unhinging of the
Western Gaze in Caribbean Postcards | Sam Vásquez 270
thirteen | Springtime for Hitler Every Year: Dani Levy’s Hitler
Comedy My Führer (2007) | Veronika Fuechtner 294
Contributors 315
Index 319
Color plates follow page 170