IMC 2020: Sessions
Session 1220: 'It's either funny or it's not', I: The Boundaries of Humour and Laughter in the Middle Ages
Wednesday 8 July 2020, 14.15-15.45
Sponsor: | Trivent Publishing |
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Organiser: | Kleio Pethainou, Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh |
Moderator/Chair: | Kleio Pethainou, Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh |
Paper 1220-a | Crossing the Line: Taboo Humor in Icelandic Sagas (Language: English) Index terms: Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Mentalities |
Paper 1220-b | Humour and the Individual, c. 1150-1250 (Language: English) Index terms: Mentalities, Monasticism |
Paper 1220-c | Outdated Humour: Are Mären and Fabliaux Still Able to Shock and Amuse? (Language: English) Index terms: Language and Literature - French or Occitan, Social History |
Abstract | This session explores humour in the Middle Ages, and the ways it was expressed in literature, art, and thought. Simultaneously transgressive and socially specific, humour challenges and defines boundaries at the same time. It can be a relief mechanism and an instrument of control and propaganda, and it can contribute to the ways societies and individuals define themselves. This session explores taboo humour in Islandic sagas, the transgressive and shocking value of fabliaux and maeren humour, and humour's articulation of selfhood in the century up to c.1252. |