Our panel 'Only joking': Negotiating offensive humour in interaction took place at the 18th International Pragmatics Conference at Brussels, 9-14 July 2023.
Offensive humour is a broad category, including but not limited to teasing, sarcasm, put downs and jocular insults. Our panel generated a rich discussion of the theoretical and practical challenges that offensive humour presents, such as how to identify speakers’ humorous and/or offensive intentions, the nature of offensive messages, and how recipients can hold speakers accountable for having caused offence. The contributions shed new light on how language functions as the critical vehicle for committing offensive humour, as well as how it is perceived, negotiated and/or ignored by participants in interaction. Following the successful panel, we are currently preparing a special issue of Pragmatics & Cognition on the topic of offensive humour.
Panel timetable
Session 1
8.30-9.00 Chi-Hé Elder, Eleni Kapogianni and Ibi Reichl. Panel introduction: ‘“Only joking”: Negotiating offensive humour in interaction’.
9.00-9.30 Michael Haugh (The University of Queensland), Rosina Marquez Reiter (The Open University), (Un)intended offence: intentionality and scales in the negotiation of offensive humour
9.30-10.00 Tahmineh Tayebi (Aston University), Implied offensive language on social media
Session 2
10.30-11.00 Eleni Kapogianni, Chi-Hé Elder, Isabella Reichl, The lifecycle of “edgy” stand-up jokes: from rhetoric to offended audiences
11.00-11.30 Mihaela-Viorica Constantinescu (University of Bucharest), Having a license for offensive humour. The case of emigrant Romanian stand-up comedians’ discourse
11.30-12.00 Ibukun Filani, Egocentrism and salience in stand-up interaction
Session 3
13.45-14.15 Sanna-Kaisa Tanskanen (University of Helsinki), Ylva Biri (University of Helsinki), Offensive humour and ‘only joking’ claims on Reddit
14.15-14.45 Vahid Parvaresh (Anglia Ruskin University), Hateful illocutions and humour
14.45-15.15 Dimitris Serafis (Università della Svizzera Italiana (USI)), Stavros Assimakopoulos (University of Malta), Anna Piata (University of Neuchâtel), Using humour to call out racism: political satire, the right to offend and take offence
Session 4
17.30-18.00 Ellen Breitholtz (University of Gothenburg), Vladislav Maraev (University of Gothenburg), Christine Howes (University of Gothenburg), Deniable offenses – different ways of communicating controversial messages
18.00-18.30 Laurence Horn, Accountability and its discontents [online]
18.30-19.00 Roundtable discussion