Leticia Neria PhD thesis - Research@StAndrews:FullText ...

were discussed. In that chapter we saw that, as Paul McGhee points out, ‘the quality
most frequently emphasized through the centuries has been incongruity’. 43 Therefore, I
will start our analysis observing how incongruity was part of various acts of humour in
the comics studied here in order to express political discontent, to portray the social
imaginary, or/and to criticise society. Since we already discussed the characteristics of
the incongruity in humour, we can just remind ourselves briefly that we recognise it in
‘todo aquello que despierta interés y produce desconcierto, o sea, ante todo, el disparate,
la contradicción’. 44 We also see incongruity when an element in the narrative frustrates
our expectations, is inappropriate, does not belong to the context, or does not
correspond with the presented stereotypes.
But on some occasions incongruity is not enough to transform a regular act into
an act of humour, and this is because, as McGhee states, incongruity is necessary in
humour, but insufficient by itself. 45 Therefore, I will trace which relevant mechanisms
are used in these comic books to bring difficult topics into discussion. In the three
comic books incongruity is used to trigger hilarity. However, those jokes which refer to
political or social reality are always related to an outcome which is based on the comic
book’s context, and brings a benefit to the author, the reader, or both. These include
relief, the possibility of aggression, becoming distanced from real life situations, and
others. I will examine these mechanisms in this chapter. I begin by showing how these
mechanisms reveal the social mood and by uncovering them, the discussion of the
content and its interpretation becomes more complex and rich.
Hermelinda Linda is an incongruous comic itself since the stories are about
‘real’ witchery, magic potions and evil spells, which themselves are illogical topics. But
43
Paul E. McGhee. Humor. Its Origin and Development (San Francisco: W.H. Freeman and Company,
1979), p. 9.
44
Sigmund Freud, El chiste y su relación con lo inconsciente (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2008), p. 153.
45 McGhee, Humor. Its Origin… p. 10.
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