Books > Social sciences
|
Buy Now
Wit's End - Women's Humor as Rhetorical and Performative Strategy (Paperback)
Loot Price: R1,336
Discovery Miles 13 360
|
|
Wit's End - Women's Humor as Rhetorical and Performative Strategy (Paperback)
Series: Composition, Literacy, and Culture
Expected to ship within 10 - 15 working days
|
In Wit’s End, Sean Zwagerman offers an original perspective on
women’s use of humor as a performative strategy as seen in works
of twentieth-century American literature. He argues that women
whose direct, explicit performative speech has been traditionally
denied, or not taken seriously, have often turned to humor as a
means of communicating with men. The book examines both the
potential and limits of women’s humor as a rhetorical strategy in
the writings of James Thurber, Zora Neale Hurston, Dorothy Parker,
Edward Albee, Louise Erdrich, and others. For Zwagerman, these
texts “talk back” to important arguments in humor studies and
speech-act theory. He deconstructs the use of humor in select
passages by employing the theories of J. L. Austin, John Searle,
Jacques Derrida, Shoshana Felman, J. Hillis Miller, and Eve
Kosofsky Sedgwick. Zwagerman offers arguments both for and against
these approaches while advancing new thinking on humor as the
“end”—both the goal and limit—of performative strategy, and
as a means of expressing a full range of serious purposes.
Zwagerman contends that women’s humor is not solely a subversive
act, but instead it should be viewed in the total speech situation
through context, motives, and intended audience. Not strictly a
transgressive influence, women’s humor is seen as both a social
corrective and a reinforcement of established ideologies. Humor has
become an epistemology, an “attitude” or slant on one’s
relation to society. Zwagerman seeks to broaden the scope of
performativity theory beyond the logical pragmatism of
deconstruction and looks to the use of humor in literature as a
deliberate stylization of experiences found in real-world social
structures, and as a tool for change. Zwagerman contends that
women\u2019s humor is not solely a subversive act, but instead it
should be viewed in the total speech situation through context,
motives, and intended audience. Not strictly a transgressive
influence, women\u2019s humor is seen as both a social corrective
and a reinforcement of established ideologies. Humor has become an
epistemology, an \u201cattitude\u201d or slant on one\u2019s
relation to society. Zwagerman seeks to broaden the scope of
performativity theory beyond the logical pragmatism of
deconstruction and looks to the use of humor in literature as a
deliberate stylization of experiences found in real-world social
structures, and as a tool for change.
General
Imprint: |
University of Pittsburgh Press
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
Composition, Literacy, and Culture |
Release date: |
April 2010 |
Firstpublished: |
March 2010 |
Authors: |
Sean Zwagerman
|
Dimensions: |
215 x 140 x 20mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Paperback
|
Pages: |
264 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-8229-6074-4 |
Categories: |
Books >
Social sciences >
General
|
LSN: |
0-8229-6074-5 |
Barcode: |
9780822960744 |
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
|
You might also like..
|