The personal is powerful: A qualitative inquiry into women's use of humor.

摘要

The purpose of this study was to begin a qualitative exploration of women's humor as a source of power through the lived experiences of female comedians. More specifically, this research addressed the types of humor women use in public spaces and a possible relationship between humor and concepts of power. Five interviews were conducted with female comedians in the Boston area using grounded theory. Gendered humor, narrative humor, coping humor, subversive humor, and sexual humor emerged as humor types that women use in comedic performances. Participants also reported that humor connects to power positively as a tool of empowerment and as a type of "soft" power, and negatively through representations of misogyny. Implications of this study are discussed in their applicability to real world contexts and future research.