While reinventing America, we have often come to the common theme of asking ourselves the question "what is and has been our national identity?"  We have looked at certain aspects of this identity in historical and contemporary contexts; in both mainstream writings and ones less so.  Something which I think is rarely looked at in such analyses, however, is the humorous side of our national character.  I believe everyone and everything has a comic side to it.  So it seemed natural to me that something was missing out of our study this national character.  Although humor and comedy is such a large part of our society today, I think this is something which is seldom looked at in a historical and ever-changing light.

What is Humor?

Since the beginning of time, humankind has turned to some form of humor or entertainment for enjoyment outside and inside the domain of the day to day working life. Like so many human attributes, humor and laughter distinguish us from animals; it is thought to be a uniquely human quality. Yet it's purpose and origin is obscure and, therefore, of great interest. The ambiguity surrounding this subject explains it's subjective nature on an interactive level. That is to say, what is amusing to someone may not be to someone else. Thus discussing the subject of humor is difficult due to its varying nature; some scholars of humor don't even try to define it.  I will discuss oratory humor in particular which in modern day terms, is found in stand up comedy and on a personal level.

Humor as a commodity

Like many things we have looked at in the development of our society, American capitalism has caused the "commodification" of so much of what we often take for granted today, even many personal aspects of our american character. Walt Whitman touches on this issue in, "Passage to India" from Leaves of Grass. The market for all forms of entertainment is forever expanding. But humor, being a quality of the self, is something which cannot be fully exploited and thus we enjoy casual joking and funny storytelling on an individual level for free. On the other hand, laughter is too often something which has a price. In short, one can pay to go see a standup comedian to enjoy his or her comical side but one may also have a friend who can raise a laugh just as easily. So we see that today oratory humor has a part in both the realm of personal interactions as well as exploitable commodities.

It wasn't always this way.

Our cultures has not always enjoyed the privilege of humor due to measures which have taken to suppress such pleasantry. For example, the earliest settlers of New England, the Puritans, were strong believers that pleasure was of evil content and that it should never be revealed in the public space. From the first years of settlement up to the start of the nineteenth century pleasure of any kind, including humor, was a taboo subject.

What happened?

The goal of this discussion is to look at how today's fanaticism with humor was born out of this dry and melancholy Puritan culture which founded our nation. I will discuss three characters in particular whose elements of humor can be seen in much of today's culture. The "Yankee", the "backwoodsman", and the "minstrel" are terms used for these characters which I have borrowed from historical works. These terms are commonly used as the "comic trio" who were conceived out of our originally anti-humorous culture and who form the base of modern American oratory humor. Click on the images below to view each in more detail.

The Yankee	The Backwoodsman	The Minstrel

 

Created by Julian Fulton on 3/20/98