Racism in comedy reappraised: back to little England?

Peters, L; Becker, S

Abstract

The article was originally researched and presented to consider issues of taste in this ‘New British Comedy’ era exemplified by television, film, and stage shows of the previous decade, such as ‘Little Britain’, Sacha Baron Cohen’s ‘Borat…’ and ‘Mock the Week’. Considering the contemporary and continuing debate concerning the divide between satire and inappropriate racist offence, the article now revisits the ways in which comedy reflects broader British attitudes towards race and racial stereotypes.

A number of traditional social psychological theories are used to explain why racist humour is still prevalent in Britain’s multi-cultural society. In particular the article seeks to illustrate the ways in which developments in contemporary comedy reflect the move from what is termed ‘old fashioned racism’ to what Gaertner & Dovidio (1986 ) term ‘aversive racism’. The article then develops the argument to illustrate the ways in which the interactional qualities which exemplify ‘aversive racism’ are manifested in the broader socio-political context as ‘principled racism’ which warrants racist humour through the rhetoric of ‘race-blind’ liberal principles
(Sniderman, Brody & Tetlock, 1991.)

Citation

Peters, L., & Becker, S. (2010). Racism in comedy reappraised: back to little England?. Comedy Studies, 1(2), 191-200. https://doi.org/10.1386/cost.1.2.191_1

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2010
• Deposit Date: Oct 18, 2011
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 5, 2016
• Journal: Comedy Studies
• Print ISSN: 2040-610X
• Publisher: Intellect
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 1
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 191-200
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1386/cost.1.2.191_1
• Keywords: David Walliams, Matt Lucas, Little Britain, stigma, principled racism, aversive racism, racism, television comedy
• Publisher URL: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/cost/2010/00000001/00000002/art00008
• Additional Information: Additional Information : Early drafts of a paper on which this article was based were presented at: Leicester De Montfort University Symposium (2008), The International Federation for Theatre Research (IFTR) Conference Political Performance Working Group in Stellenbosch, South Africa, (2007) and The Salford International Comedy Conference (2007). Lloyd Peters has now been invited onto the Editorial Board of Comedy Studies.