9 More than laughter: Multimodal humour and the negotiation of ingroup identities in mobile instant messaging interactions
-
Agnese Sampietro
Abstract
One form of maintaining sociability and cohesion in mobile instant messaging (MIM) interactions is posting humorous content (Cruz-Moya and Sánchez- Moya 2021; Yus 2018, 2021). Online humour can be multimodal since smartphone users can easily publish verbal, auditory, and visual content. This chapter focuses on the production, negotiation, and response to humorous multimodal posts in a single WhatsApp group chat among sixteen men. Methods combine computer-mediated discourse analysis (Herring and Androutsopoulos 2015), digital conversation analysis (Giles et al. 2015), and the study of interactional humour (see Chovanec and Tsakona 2018). The analysis showed that humour in this chat was typically initiated by static images (i.e., photos, screenshots, or memes) or videos. Like other online contexts, such as Twitter and Instagram (Messerli and Yu 2018) or dyadic MIM chats (Sampietro 2021b), laughing emojis helped signal humour and show appreciation for it. Other emojis were used in a more playful manner, such as when repeating visually humorous discourse. Emojis were also a non-threatening way of bringing failed humour to an end. In addition to humorous memes, personal anecdotes and pictures of participants were elaborated upon in sustained humorous exchanges. Ageing and sex were common scripts for humour in the chat, and were used to negotiate in-group identity and reaffirm participants’ masculinity.
Abstract
One form of maintaining sociability and cohesion in mobile instant messaging (MIM) interactions is posting humorous content (Cruz-Moya and Sánchez- Moya 2021; Yus 2018, 2021). Online humour can be multimodal since smartphone users can easily publish verbal, auditory, and visual content. This chapter focuses on the production, negotiation, and response to humorous multimodal posts in a single WhatsApp group chat among sixteen men. Methods combine computer-mediated discourse analysis (Herring and Androutsopoulos 2015), digital conversation analysis (Giles et al. 2015), and the study of interactional humour (see Chovanec and Tsakona 2018). The analysis showed that humour in this chat was typically initiated by static images (i.e., photos, screenshots, or memes) or videos. Like other online contexts, such as Twitter and Instagram (Messerli and Yu 2018) or dyadic MIM chats (Sampietro 2021b), laughing emojis helped signal humour and show appreciation for it. Other emojis were used in a more playful manner, such as when repeating visually humorous discourse. Emojis were also a non-threatening way of bringing failed humour to an end. In addition to humorous memes, personal anecdotes and pictures of participants were elaborated upon in sustained humorous exchanges. Ageing and sex were common scripts for humour in the chat, and were used to negotiate in-group identity and reaffirm participants’ masculinity.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction 1
-
Part 1: Face-to-face interactions
- 1 A multimodal approach to children’s development of humor in family life 15
- 2 On target. On the role of eye-gaze during teases in face-to-face multiparty interaction 53
- 3 Humorous Smiling: A Reverse Cross-Validation of the Smiling Intensity Scale for the Identification of Conversational Humor 87
- 4 Alternative conceptualizations of the Smiling Intensity Scale (SIS) and their applications to the identification of humor 109
- 5 Facial gestures and laughter as a resource for negotiating humor in conversation 131
- 6 Multimodal humor in human-robot interaction 169
-
Part 2: Mediated interactions
- 7 Facial expressions as multimodal markers of humor: More evidence from scripted and non-scripted interactions 209
- 8 Emojis and jocular flattery in Chinese instant messaging interactions 231
- 9 More than laughter: Multimodal humour and the negotiation of ingroup identities in mobile instant messaging interactions 263
- 10 Humour and creativity in a family of strangers on Facebook 289
- 11 “Loanword translation and corrective acts are incongruous”: Debating metapragmatic stereotypes through humorous memes 319
- Index 355
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction 1
-
Part 1: Face-to-face interactions
- 1 A multimodal approach to children’s development of humor in family life 15
- 2 On target. On the role of eye-gaze during teases in face-to-face multiparty interaction 53
- 3 Humorous Smiling: A Reverse Cross-Validation of the Smiling Intensity Scale for the Identification of Conversational Humor 87
- 4 Alternative conceptualizations of the Smiling Intensity Scale (SIS) and their applications to the identification of humor 109
- 5 Facial gestures and laughter as a resource for negotiating humor in conversation 131
- 6 Multimodal humor in human-robot interaction 169
-
Part 2: Mediated interactions
- 7 Facial expressions as multimodal markers of humor: More evidence from scripted and non-scripted interactions 209
- 8 Emojis and jocular flattery in Chinese instant messaging interactions 231
- 9 More than laughter: Multimodal humour and the negotiation of ingroup identities in mobile instant messaging interactions 263
- 10 Humour and creativity in a family of strangers on Facebook 289
- 11 “Loanword translation and corrective acts are incongruous”: Debating metapragmatic stereotypes through humorous memes 319
- Index 355
