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

helps us to understand a specific culture as well as why it was used in Mexico during
the last year of Gustavo Díaz Ordaz’s presidential term and Luis Echeverría’s sexenio.
And, since the sources needed to be set in a specific time and place, it was necessary to
dedicate a chapter to the historical facts of that period.
In chapter one I examine theories of humour from various disciplines, including
sociology, psychology, and philosophy. This will help me analyse the sources as well as
understand the nature of humour and the reason why authors use it to portray and
criticise reality. This chapter is not a revision of the state of the art of humour. In
chapter one the reader will find an eclectic choice of various ideas about humour and its
relation to society. The choice was made carefully considering the questions that I was
aiming to answer. Theoretical perspectives on humour were thus narrowed to those
most useful to answer the specific questions in my research. The reader will find
information on how we recognise something as ‘humorous’, and what might be our
reaction once we are inside the language of humour. When we understand humour as
language, we then see that it communicates something to us.
Thus, humour can tell us something important about the time and place in which
it was expressed. In brief, the mechanism that develops humour is incongruity.
Incongruity can be expressed in various ways, such as breaking a common narrative
with an unexpected fact. I will give special attention to the idea of exaggeration since it
is a common mechanism of incongruity, and it is constantly used in these sources,
especially the comics. Afterwards, I consider the relationship between the act of humour
and the person who witnesses it. I explain why humour helps us cope with situations,
and why it is chosen as a means of expression. Humour makes us feel superior, brings
comfort even in insufferable times, and helps us to find the light side of uncomfortable
situations. Moreover, I discuss humour as a means of rebellion. These ideas help us to
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