Review of Lavash and Laughter – Humor in the Arab World

Last week I attended Professor Sellman’s event on humor, Lavash and Laughter. For a brief summary, the event went very well. Our wonderful classmate, Adam, brought food from Lavash Café including hummus, shawarma (lamb and chicken), falafel, gyro making material, stuffed grape leaves, and even more wonderful food that I cannot remember. Then Professor Sellman introduced the concept of humor with a joke from her son and how we as people develop humor and jokes from when we are very young. Not only did we discuss humor in the typical contemporary context we focus on in class, but we first discussed humor from the medieval Arab world and different stories that were written. Then we watched more examples of comedians from today including Bassem Youssef, Gad Elmaleh, and Amer Zahr.

The concept of humor is difficult to define because it is so different for every person. Just as people’s jokes change over time as they grow older, humor develops based on what is appropriate (or not appropriate) of the time period. For instance, we looked at a story of a hunchback who was “killed” and kept getting passed around the town. While it seems strange and rather crude now, it is important to remove our judgements and think about the time the joke was told. Furthermore, just as we had to define what Arabic poetry, Arabic architecture, and Arabic comics all are, we had to think about what Arabic comedy is during this event.

We could define it with respect to language, but we have seen a lot of Arabic comedy performed in English so that wouldn’t make much sense in all honesty.

What about location? Should people who make jokes about the Arab world have to live in the Arab world? I think this is much closer, however we need to remember those in the diasporas and have migrated away from the Arab world. Amer Zahr is an excellent example of this because he grew up in America with parents who emigrated from Palestine. We can’t forget Gad Elmaleh either since he was born in Morocco and then went on to generate an excellent career in France and is now trying his hand in America. Therefore, there must be a different unifying factor.

Another way we could think about it is with respect to the nationality of the comedians. This line of thinking would make more sense because if anyone is able to joke about what happens in the Arab world and between Arab people it is Arabs. That would make sense for all of the comedians we have seen and were shown at this event.

However, what if they aren’t making a joke about Arab mannerisms, border conflicts, or trump’s immigration policies? Does that mean whatever an Arab person jokes about is an Arab joke? I think while all of the comedians we viewed at this event had their jokes centered around Arab people and the Arab world the context of the joke should also be taken into account.

Comedians make jokes to point out nuances in society, whether they make them for fun or to further a political movement. All of the comedians we watched at this event, and the stories we discussed from medieval times, all did just that, and I most certainly enjoyed listening and learning through the laughs and food.