‘Just kidding?’ – an exploratory audience study into the ways Flemish youth with a minoritized ethnic identity make sense of ethnic humor and the politics of offense

Abstract

Abstract Recently, ethnic humor (targeting ethnoreligious identities) is increasingly questioned in European and Western countries, sparking controversy on online and traditional media platforms. Absent from the mediated and academic debate are the opinions from targeted subjects of the joke. This qualitative audience study aims to add to critical humor scholarship by providing insight into how targeted groups make sense of disputes of offense. We interviewed 35 participants (ages 15–24) with a minoritized ethnic identity (mostly a Moroccan or Turkish diasporic background) and religious identity (all identified as Muslim) on how they negotiate offensive (ethnic) humor. Moreover, we asked participants to reflect on the politics of offense (i.e. the power relations underlying the process of publicly claiming offense) and the role media play in the discussion of offended feelings in relation to (ethnic) humor. A thematic analysis of three focus groups indicates how participants’ negotiations were always influenced by contextual factors and tied to their identities, both on a sociopolitical and personal level. Further, participants were highly conscious about their minoritized position in debates on offensive ethnic humor and how this relates to societal power inequalities. As such, they recognized how the politics of offense regarding ethnic humor highlight boundaries between social groups.