Invisible Joke - The Scientific Theory of Laughter in the Context of Invisible Man
I am a HUGE fan of comedy. I spend a lot of time thinking about and researching why things are funny. In my research, I came across a TedTalk about one theory about what makes people laugh - and I think it sheds light as to why laughter undermines in Invisible Man.
The theory (which has changed my life!) is called the Benign Violation Theory of humor (here's a link to the TedTalk if you want: https://youtu.be/ysSgG5V-R3U). The Benign Violation theory states that anything that makes you laugh is a violation of expectations, social norms, or comfort zone, but it violates in a way that is acceptable, or benign. For example, tickling makes us laugh. Why? Tickling is a violation of personal space, but not enough that it makes a person upset. It is a benign violation. If either the "benign" element or the "violation" element were taken away, we would not laugh. So, using this tickling scenario, if some random stranger came up to you and started tickling you, it wouldn't be very funny. It would be too much of a violation. At the same time, if a friend came up to you and put their hand on your shoulder, it wouldn't be funny either. It would be too benign, giving you no reason to laugh. But if a friend came up to you and started tickling you, you would laugh (and maybe also scream at them. Depends on the friend and the aggressiveness of the tickling, the level of violation). The same rule applies for words. When someone makes a pun, they are violating the rules of the English language in a way that changes its meaning, but it's not too much of a violation that it's incomprehensible. If you don't find puns very funny, one-liners follow this format too - anything that makes you laugh does, according to the theory. Laughter is, in a sense, a panic response. You need both the violation and the benign elements in order to make someone laugh.
So why is laughter so undermining in Invisible Man? The way I read it is that the characters who are laughing are looking at a phenomenon which the narrator accepts as perfect reality, and seeing it as both a violation of truth and benign. For example, to the Narrator, nothing about Mr. Norton is a violation, and therefore nothing about him can be funny - he is perfectly respectable. But to the Vet, Norton and the Narrator represent a violation of thought, represent something that is wrong with the way society works. He yells, "You cannot see or hear or smell the truth of what you see--and you, looking for destiny! It's classic!" (95). This is how he sees them as a violation, one is blind to the truth (the Narrator's thought process is incorrect to the Vet) and one is looking for "destiny," which is also wrong to the Vet. Yet, the Vet still laughs at Norton, crying "the campus, what a destiny!" which is arguably more undermining (94). Not only does he see Norton as a violation, something which is unacceptable, he sees him as benign - Norton is not a threat to him. Thus, his laughing at them shows them that not only are they wrong, they are comically wrong, they cannot be taken seriously - and the Narrator only takes Norton seriously. This is why the narrator is so confused when the Vet laughs, and when Grandpa laughs. They are both seeing violations which the Narrator cannot see, they are invisible to him, and the other characters seeing those violations as benign, not enough of a threat to be scary. (This also gets into the blurry line between comedy and horror. Steve Martin once said, "comedy is the art of making people laugh without making them throw up." But I digress. Maybe that's another blogpost.)
What do you guys think? Is there something else about laughter that makes it so undermining, and if so, what is it? Why are these two characters the "comedians"? Are they, in some way, a benign violation themselves? If you want to go down the rabbit hole and think about the line between comedy and horror: how do we view the Grandpa and the Vet's laughter at social phenomenons which are horrifying?
The Benign Violation theory does seem to work now that you mention it... But I don't know if I would give it full credit for the reason the Vet and Grandpa laugh. Though the theory does hold up, I feel it's more like poking fun at a friend at their expense or "roasting" them. I don't know if that would be too high on the violation scale but they seem to be making fun of another character who doesn't fully understand why the "comedian" is making fun of them, and the reader laughs along (maybe) because they're creating an object of ridicule. For the horror part I think that the "comedians" believe that the readers will laugh along with them at their created person of ridicule even though the points that they bring up about that person may not be socially acceptable.
ReplyDeleteNever heard of the Benign Violation theory before, and your explanation makes a lot of sense. Yet I don't think that the violations are invisible, though. Deep down I believe the narrator knows what's wrong and what's right, but chooses to ignore his instincts in his extreme naivety. I could write an entire blog post about how naive he is (maybe I will), and I think it better to attribute his lack of laughing throughout the early chapters as him being unaware. The Grandpa and the Vet are natural comedians because of the ridiculous situations they are put in, a surreal dream and an insane asylum. The entire book feels like anightmare to me when I'm reading so I almost expect the thin line between comedy and horror.
ReplyDeleteThat theory is actually pretty neat, now that you mention it. And now that I think about it, it does seem to make sense within the realms of the book. It might not be the magic bullet that explains everything going on, but I think I can see how it applies to the vet and grandfather laughing. Like you said with the vet, the narrator and Mr. Norton represent something inherently wrong with the way the vet sees things, but it doesn't matter, since the vet has come to expect the wrongness and doesn't think anything about it. With the grandfather, I'd imagine it's the same thing. The narrator conforming to society is something the grandfather doesn't like, or doesn't expect. But at the same time, the narrator is falling into a pattern that many people do. In a way, that makes this deviation somewhat typical of him, giving the grandfather the benign sense to laugh at the deviation. I'm not sure if that's exactly it, but I like the idea of benign violation. It helps make sense of the book a little bit, however much that may be.
ReplyDeleteThis was a really cool post! I hadn’t really thought about laughter as a benign violation in this book. I would add, that not only is laughter undermining conventions, but also, as Mr. Mitchell pointed out in class, allowing whoever is laughing to rise above the person being laughed at. For example, when Bledsoe laughs (cruelly) at the narrator, the narrator feels diminished, and when the vet laughs at Bledsoe, he brings him down to the vet’s level, reducing him to a mere joke, instead of the important man he claims to be.
ReplyDeleteI love this! I think you are definitely right and this theory helps clarify why the grandfather and vet are laughing, though I don't think Ellison was actively thinking about this theory when he was writing the book since the theory is something that humans sort of understand naturally. Nice post.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really interesting post! It makes a lot of sense that laughter would be undermining because it implies that the situation is weird and nonthreatening,I never thought about it that way. The Vet feels untouchable to Norton, who's role in society he sees as totally ridiculous, so to the Vet everything relating to Norton is funny. This also makes the Grandfather's laughter, and that of the prologue version of the narrator make much more sense. The fact that the laughter seems to emanate from characters who are removed from society in some way that makes them untouchable also seems important. With the grandfather it is his age, with the vet it is his "insanity," and with the narrator it is his use of his own invisibility. This could potentially support your argument because the laughter is coming from characters who don't feel threatened. Just a thought, great post!
ReplyDeleteI think that comedy is a crucial part of Invisible Man. It has had me laugh out loud in parts of the book that I wouldn't have expected. I think that this idea of Benign violation makes a lot of sense in the context of the book. It helps show how characters in the book think of each other besides being rude or showing respect. Great post.
ReplyDeletebro this is so interesting !!! I definitely agree with everything you said, and I think the Benign Violation theory is a really great lens for analyzing the function of humor in the book. The narrator's slow coming to terms with the problems in society directly corresponds to the amount he laughs. Before, aside from the prologue laughter only appeared in the book from other characters (the Grandfather and the vet for example) but as the narrator becomes more conscious of his circumstances we get the first of his laughs, and it eventually becomes more and more prevalent. So, what you said about him understanding violation - as opposed to taking everything at face value and accepting it has the way things must be - and therefore better understanding humor, makes a lot of sense.
ReplyDeleteThis is what I want to write my essay about! You're right, humor lies at the intersection of danger and uselessness. That's why The Horribly Slow Murderer with the Incredibly Inefficient Weapon is funny. Or, more generally, humor is the intersection of expected and unexpected (I think of this joke: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/06/sarah-silverman-a-speck-of-dust-netflix) so in the vet scene, for two exceptionally blind people to be looking for destiny is rich with comedy. What we need to look at next with this is how laughing makes the joker invincible/invisible. Maybe because the joker can see something others cannot, and lords it over them by joking.
ReplyDeleteOkay, first what I think is undermining about laughter is that is shows that one is not afraid of whatever they are laughing at. When you laugh at someone, they sort of lose their power of you, because you're not scared of them (of course, this kind of assumes that fear and power are tied, another potential blogpost haha). For the vet and the grandfather, their laughter shows that they are not afraid of the powers that should/are oppressing them. As we saw in the prologue, the narrator can laugh at the things in his life once he realizes that he is invisible.
ReplyDeleteThe other thing is that you're right - the line between horror and comedy is blurred in Invisible Man. The way that these horribly traumatic events are narrated in a nonchalant, or even humorous way, is interesting. It reminds a lot of how my parents and their friends tell stories, especially about Yugoslavia when it was war-torn. They discuss all of these events seriously, but humor and sarcasm are weaved in. They laugh at the absurdity of the situations they faced, and use humor as a way to cope with what they through. Is the point of humor in Invisible Man similar?