It’s no joke: The critical power of a laughing chorus

Abstract

There is no known time in history, nor known human community without laughter. Laughter imbues our social life. Laughter dominates our daily interactions, perhaps more visibly so on social media, where it is now a weapon wielded frequently against marketers. Yet, marketing theory paid little attention to laughter as a social phenomenon or a collective consumer (re)action. This article begins to address this neglect through an integrative review of theories of laughter and specifically by introducing Mikhail Bakhtin’s notion of a laughing chorus. I engage the notion as a way to understand the internet publics’ rowdy laughter directed at marketing. I show that seemingly nihilistic, irresponsible and discordant laughter is nonetheless an efficacious and notably polyvocal social commentary. To probe further the power of a laughing chorus, I draw on the works of Henri Bergson and Alenka Zupancic and elaborate on laughter as a form of expression that does not depend on reason and argumentation for its effects. I contend that a critical impetus of a laughing chorus may not always be in its content, but in the comic element, centred on repetition. That is, collective, excessive laughter involves a distinct mode of critique, which is not premised on discursive deliberation. I conclude with a reflection on theoretical and methodological opportunities in taking laughter seriously in marketing and consumer culture studies.

The cute and the fluffy

“…Internet users worldwide disseminate information in the form of memes while adding intertextual allusions and elements that may drift far from the originally intended message. This is also what can be seen as the main difference in laughter between earlier times and today: laughter now projects in ways and to distances that, for example, medieval laughter could not (Kravets 2021). It is cited and reframed by the media, as a result of which the potential audience grows exponentially-which is precisely the aim of political communication.…”

“…It is necessarily communal, triggering the emotions of the audiences who are always keeping their eyes open for a potentially humorous stimulus. Online laughter does not differ in its essence, either, although it maximises the aspect of reflexive laughter and intertextuality as it "erupts momentarily and ferociously, bringing together hundreds of discordant voices, who laugh at each other as much as at the target" (Kravets 2021). Internet users worldwide disseminate information in the form of memes while adding intertextual allusions and elements that may drift far from the originally intended message.…”

“…Humour instead signalled that there was a questionable, dubious or incongruous aspect to the political communication, and the subsequent memes that commented on the original stimulus made the most of that discovery. The fact that this often means an over-literal, corporeal, concrete and simplified interpretation of the stimulus (Kravets 2021) is of secondary importance. As the cases analysed above illustrate, memes aim to provoke a discussion and often move the political agenda from the rational to the emotional level.…”

Epistemic in/justice: Towards ‘Other’ ways of knowing

“…Failures to appreciate these cultural differences can lead to affective silences and emotional insularity on the part of the observer/researcher. Ignoring socio-linguistic realities through expression style exclusion such as gestures, emotional tone (Garcia, 2019) and discounting various discursive forms thwarts any effort to embrace Other knowledge in order to redefine marginality (Kravets, 2021).…”