This two-day conference explores the role of humour as a political coping mechanism and illuminates its uses across disciplines and periods, stimulating fresh conversations about resistance to power. This conference builds on recent scholarship in analysing fascism and authoritarianism as global phenomena. The organisers aim to connect an interdisciplinary range of scholars—at all career levels—who will draw on history, literature, political science, and journalism to illuminate the political uses of laughter.

Presentation

The confderence will take place on 28-29 March 2025 in the Confluence Lecture Theatre at Durham University (with each day running from 9:00 am to 5:10 pm). The conference is open to all who are interested in attending. A registration fee is not required.

Professor Alya Aglan from the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne in Paris will deliver a keynote address in French with simultaneous English translation on Saturday 29 March from 9:30 to 10:50 am. She is a world-renowned specialist of the Second World War and the French Resistance. Her address is entitled “Le pouvoir, une mécanique mimétique.”

The conference is generously co-sponsored by Durham University’s Department of History, the German History Society (GHS), and the Association for the Study of Modern Italy (ASMI).

For all additional information, please refer to our website: https://laughterasapoliticalcopingmechanism.wordpress.com

Conference organisers : Benedetta Carnaghi and Helen Roche. 

Schedule

Friday 28 March

9:00 – 9:30 am: Welcome and Breakfast – CB-0021 and CB-0025

9:30 – 9:40 am: Conference Introduction – CB-0008

9:40 – 10:40 am ~ Keynote 1 + Q&A – CB-0008

Benedetta Carnaghi (she/her), British Academy Newton International Fellow, and Helen Roche (she/her), Associate Professor in Modern Cultural History, Durham University, UK

10:40 am – 12:20 pm ~ Panel 1: Music and Performance – CB-0008

Moderator: Vincent Trott (he/him), Senior Lecturer in History, The Open University, UK

• 10:40 – 11:00 am: Clare V. Church (she/her), Fellow, Institute of Historical Research, UK. Safe, Sanitized, and Altogether Unsexy: Investigating the Popularity and Impact of the Andrews Sisters’ Comedic Songs Throughout the Second World War
• 11:00 – 11:20 am: Jessica Wardhaugh (she/her), Associate Professor and Reader in French Studies, University of Warwick, UK. The Limits of Laughter: Song, Satire and Subversion in Vichy France
• 11:20 – 11:40 am: Klara Beetz (she/they), MA student in Theater Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. Subversive Joy: Utopian Imagination in the Travesty Cabaret of East Berlin’s Hibaré
• 11:40 am – 12:00 pm: Adeyemi Johnson Ademowo (he/him), Professor, Department of Sociology, and Noah Opeyemi Balogun (he/him), Senior Lecturer, Department of Conflict, Peace and Strategic Studies, Afe Babalola University, Nigeria? Satirical Music as Political Resistance: The Case of Fela Kuti’s Afrobeat (1970-1990)

12:00 – 12:20 pm: Q&A

12:30 – 1:30 pm: Lunch – CB-0021 and CB-0025

1:30 – 3:10 pm ~ Panel 2: Caricature and Visual Satire – CB-0008

Moderator: Katharina Friege (she/her), Early Career Research Fellow, Merton College, University of Oxford, UK

• 1:30 – 1:50 pm: Yuetong Li (she/her), PhD student, University of Cambridge, UK. Caricature in Publications and the Struggle for Freedom of Speech in Germany (1874-1914)
• 1:50 – 2:10 pm: Vincent Trott (he/him), Senior Lecturer in History, The Open University, UK. Political Humour, Preparedness, and the Fear of Invasion in the United States, 1914–1917
• 2:10 – 2:30 pm: Luciano Cheles (he/him), Emeritus Professor, Laboratoire Universitaire Histoire Cultures Italie Europe, Université Grenoble Alpes, France. Graphic Attacks: Satire in Italy, from the 1920s to the Present
• 2:30 – 2:50 pm: Serena Vandi (she/her), Assistant Professor in Italian, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, and Honorary Faculty Research Fellow at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, University of Oxford, UK. Naked and Layered: Satire and Power in Three Italian Case Studies

2:50 – 3:10 pm: Q&A

3:10 – 3:30 pm: Coffee Break – CB-0021 and CB-0025

3:30 – 5:10 pm ~ Panel 3 (Online): Humorous Resistance – CB-0008

Moderator: Xiaofei Tu (he/him), Associate Professor, Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, Appalachian State University, USA

• 3:30 – 3:50 pm: Nhi Yen Le (she/her), PhD student, Department of Modern History and Society, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway. How the Duck Quacked Back: Vịt Đực’s Appropriation, Satire, Censorship, and Resistance in the 1930s Colonial Vietnam
• 3:50 – 4:10 pm: Roman Mamin (he/him), MA student in History, Paris Cité Université, France. Pragmatic Horizons of Late Soviet Jokes: Situational Positions, Gender Roles, Discourse Communities
• 4:10 – 4:30 pm: Valentina Marcella (she/her), Assistant Professor in Turkish Studies, Università degli Studi di Napoli L’Orientale, Italy. Coping with Authoritarianism: Humour and Satire in Turkey
• 4:30 – 4:50 pm: Andrés Francisco Dapuez (he/him), Full-time Researcher, National Research Council of Argentina (CONICET), and Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Maryland, College Park, USA. Moral Consumption, Throwing Polenta Away, and Joking about the State

4:50 – 5:10 pm: Q&A

7:30 pm: Conference Dinner – Location TBD

Saturday 29 March

9:00 – 9:30 am: Breakfast – Scarborough Cafe

9:30 – 10:50 am ~ Keynote 2 (in French with English translation) + Q&A – CB-0008

• Keynote Speaker: Alya Aglan (she/her), Professor of Contemporary History and Director of the Institut Pierre Renouvin, Université Paris 1 – Panthéon-Sorbonne, France

English Reader: Ben Fried (he/him), SSHRC/Killam Postdoctoral Fellow, Dalhousie University, Canada

10:50 am – 12:30 pm ~ Panel 4: Fascism and Dictatorship – CB-0008

Moderator: Jessica Wardhaugh (she/her), Associate Professor and Reader in French Studies, University of Warwick, UK

• 10:50 – 11:10 am: Francesco Saccà (he/him), PhD student in History and Transmission of Cultural Heritage, Università degli Studi della Campania Luigi Vanvitelli, Italy. A Script to Entertain Them: The Humoristic ‘Movie’ Language of Marc’Aurelio during Fascism (1936-1943)
• 11:10 – 11:30 am: Alexandra Oeser (she/her), Professor, Department of Sociology, Université Paris Nanterre, France. Laughter in National-Socialist Concentration Camps: Social Hierarchy and Political Engagement in the Art-Work of Nina Jirsíková
• 11:30 – 11:50 am: Natalie Schwabl (she/her), PhD student in Modern History in the Faculty of Arts, Languages, Literature and Humanities, Sorbonne University, Paris, France. Coping with Fascism through Humour: Anticlerical Caricatures in Post-War-Croatia (1945-1946)
• 11:50 am – 12:10 pm: Paolo Scotton (he/him), Lecturer, and Raquel Cercós (she/her), Adjunct Professor, Department of Theory and History of Education, University of Barcelona, Spain. Joan Brossa: When Poetry Turns into Revolt

12:10 – 12:30 pm: Q&A

12:30 – 1:30 pm: Lunch – Scarborough Café

1:30 – 3:10 pm ~ Panel 5: Postfascism – CB-0008

Moderator: Luciano Cheles (he/him), Emeritus Professor, Laboratoire Universitaire Histoire Cultures Italie Europe, Université Grenoble Alpes, France

• 1:30 – 1:50 pm: Sophie Dubillot (she/her), PhD graduate in History, The Open University, UK. Visual Humour by Returning French Prisoners of War and Forced Workers in Liberation France (1944-1946)
• 1:50 – 2:10 pm: Katharina Friege (she/her), Early Career Research Fellow, Merton College, University of Oxford, UK. Broadcasting Humour: Rubble, Reconstruction, and the Radio in Great Britain and Western Germany, 1945-1960
• 2:10 – 2:30 pm: Simbarashe Marowa (he/him), PhD student, UGent, Belgium and Concordia University, Canada, and Ushe Kufakurinani (he/him), Lecturer in International Development, University of Sussex, UK. Social Media and Playful Engagements on the Political Economy: The Case of Zimbabwe
• 2:30 – 2:50 pm: Xiaofei Tu (he/him), Associate Professor, Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, Appalachian State University, USA. The Role of Humor in Resisting Autocracy: The Case of China with Historical Precedents

2:50 – 3:10 pm: Q&A

3:10 – 3:30 pm: Coffee Break – Scarborough Cafe

3:30 – 5:10 pm ~ Panel 6 (Online): Humour in Extremis – CB-0008

Moderator: Benedetta Carnaghi (she/her), British Academy Newton International Fellow, Durham University, UK

• 3:30 – 3:50 pm: A. Austin Garey (she/her), Research Scholar, Kennan Institute, Wilson Center, Washington, DC, USA. Visual Humour in European Home Fronts: Britain and Ukraine
• 3:50 – 4:10 pm: Zlata Osipova (she/her), PhD student, Mariupol State University, Ukraine. We Against Them: Humor as a Unifying Force in Ukraine’s Resistance
• 4:10 – 4:30 pm: Alireza Salehi-Nejad (he/him), Researcher, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Australia. Challenging Authority Through Humor: A Study of The Evolution of Political Satire in Modern Iran from the Persian Constitutional Revolution to the Present
• 4:30 – 4:50 pm: Aidan Jones (he/him), Adjunct Lecturer, King’s College London, UK. The Death Penalty, Humour, and the United States

4:50 – 5:10 pm: Q&A