Politics of Laughter in the Social Media Age

Shepherd Mpofu is Associate Professor in Media and Communications at the University of Limpopo, South Africa. He is an African Humanities Programme Fellow. He is co-editor of Mediating Xenophobia in Africa (Palgrave, 2020). He regularly publishes in academic journals on themes such as media and identity, media and protests, gender and race.

• Chapter 1: Introduction.- Part 1: Humour, Ridicule and Politics.- Chapter 2: the Aesthetics of ‘laughing at Power’ in an African Cyber Sphere.- Chapter 3: This Is a Laughing Matter: Social Media as a Sphere of Trolling Power in Malawi and Zimbabwe.- Chapter 4: Memes, Politics and Social Criticism in the Global South: Culture of Political Satire in Contemporary Kerala, India.- Chapter 5: Speaking “truth” to Power? Political Satire and the Mediation of the Zimbabwean Crisis in the “new Dispensation Era”.- Chapter 6: Humour, Politics and Mnangagwa’s Presidency: a Reception Study of Civic Intellectuals.- Chapter 7. Visualising Politicians Through the Prism of Political Memes.- Chapter 8: Inside-out: Politicians Disparaging Electorates and Democracy With Humour –the Case of Senator Dino Melaye in Nigeria.- Part 2: Humour and the Everyday.- Chapter 9: Laughing at Trouble: an Exploration of Online Economic Satire in Zimbabwe.- Chapter 10: the Curious Case of “coconut Kelz”: a Rhetorical Analysis of a South African Satirist’s Use of Humour to Engage in Persuasive Commentary on Social Issues.- Chapter 11: ‘humor and the Politics of the Everyday’: Reading Amateur Online Videos in Zimbabwe as a Subaltern Counter-public.- Chapter 12: Pastoral and Presidential Parody in the Digital Space: an Analysis of Naijas Craziest.- Chapter 13: Humour as Core Brand Element in Digital Public Speaking Assessment in South Africa.- Part 3: Humour, Ridicule and Identity.- Chapter 14: ‘if Ever I Offended You I Am Sorry’: Body Shaming and Embodied Racist Humour and Black Twitter in South Africa.- Chapter 15: Gender Performances and Irony in the Online Presentification Narrative: a Study of the "Katylene" Case in Brazil.- Chapter 16: Digital Football Fandom, Ethnicity and the Fragile Zimbabwe National Identity.- Chapter 17: Mental Models and the Myth of Multiculturalism and Postracialism in Zapiro and Yalo’s Cartoons on Social Media.- Chapter 18: Humour, Identity and Ethnicity in the Zimbabwean Political Landscape.- Chapter 19: Laughter in Turbulent Times: Comedy and Religion in the Rise of Brazil’s Far Right