Date of Award

2020

Document Type

Research Paper

Department

Whittier Scholars Program

First Advisor

Patti McCarthy

Abstract

The entirety of my senior project was a forty five minute stand up comedy show which took place on November 20, 2019 and a paper. The paper, which you will soon read, is a thorough analysis of jokes I told during my stand-up show. In this paper I break down the most controversial jokes I told, why I told them and why they weren’t just funny but socially acceptable. As a comic and a storyteller I only feel that it is right to always be respectful and politically correct to all groups in our society, whether I am included in them or not. Therefore I feel as if this paper is the first beam in the bridge connecting comedy with all other aspects of society today. I decided to embark into the world of stand-up comedy two years ago. Before that I really did not know where I fit into this world. I knew I was a little weird and people always told me I was funny so I thought why not. During my first show, I knew that me wanting to do standup was much deeper than simply wanting to make people laugh. After I told me first joke I looked into the crowd and almost every single person was smiling. The smiles were genuine, sincere, and something I never really have seen before. All these people were smiling at me, they were laughing at a joke I said. This made me feel on top of the world. It is then when I noticed what the power of a joke could hold. Jokes make people feel good, they bring you to a space of euphoria. Something that I make sure of, as a comedian is to make people feel like that. A lot of comedians tend to make jokes and in the process of that pick on or put down groups of people with their jokes. That is why I chose this topic. I wanted to show that you can do an entire 45 minute standup show while being socially, racially, and politically correct.

Comments

WSP Major: Entertainment Studies

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