Humornow

  Joshua Singh Dr. Ellis EN 346D Hobbes and Superiority Theory Hobbes’s theory of laughter and humor stem from what we know as Superiority theory. It is the theory that laughter is the human response to triumph over others as well as finding oneself superior to others when they find themselves in misfortune. He believes “men laugh at mischances and indecencies, wherein there lies no wit nor jest at all” in which “sudden glory, is the passion that which makes those grimaces called laughter” (19). Hobbes’s version of superiority theory describes laughter as merely a response to a feeling of victory that one feels from the imperfections of another or their mistakes. This idea serves to caution those who do use laughter to self-deprecate in order to relate to a broader audience or talk about a broader topic. For example, many comedians first tell a joke that is somewhat demeaning to themselves in order to get a crowd laughing and feeling comfortable. Although superiority theory is ...

    This graphic novel has really been impressing me with it's ability to gracefully play on the nuances of being a young teen and navigating a new school. Regardless of the situation, everyone has at one point or another had to transition from one school to another, and there is an exceptionally harrowing experience of transferring to a new school with peers that you are unfamiliar with. Craft perfectly encapsulates the embarrassment of childhood experiences and the mortification that came from small moments such as motherly affection and trying to navigate adolescent society with popularity and bullying and Jordan's interactions with casual racism.  Jordan discusses his unique situations in ways that become understandable or relatable through his use of popular culture references in the form of movies and famous figures. It has the ability to take anyone back to the mindset of an adolescent who sees life as though they are living a movie, or trying to construct their ...

Craft’s New Kid  is a comic book about the hardships Jordan faces with friends, school, and his parents. His hardships are primarily based on how he feels as a minority and the expectations put on him by his surrounding environment. Jordan starts attending a new school, RAD, and immediately begins to notice the microaggressions in this new environment. Jordan likes to draw, and every few pages of the book there is a comic strip and drawings by Jordan. His caricatures and dramatization of the people and ideas around him were what I believed was the funniest part of the book. But, I believe there is something much deeper to this humor, it is Jordan’s way of understanding and grappling with his place in this world and the expectations that people put on him.  The first of Jordan’s drawings that we see are a back to school poster of rulers, calculators, and textbooks with evil faces on them and kids running away. The history textbook is even holding some kids looking like it is ab...

  Laura Latham  En 446D 01 April 17, 2023 New Kid Most of the humor in “New Kid” by Jerry Craft comes from the images used for the cartoons. The humor that comes from the cartoons is dramaticized so that the reader’s attention is focused on how Jordan is feeling. The graphic about Andy being scraped into the trash specifically is effectively humorous in that it grasps the reader’s attention so as to create a deeper understanding of Jordan’s struggles being a twelve year old boy.  On Jordan's first day of school, he is disheveled, and full of nerves not only from being black at a predominately white school, but because this is a new school where he is meeting everybody for the first time. At lunch, Jordan starts to feel more comfortable with a few of the boys, however he does not care for one of them, Andy. Andy is shown making racial remarks about one boy, then making fun of Jordan’s size. With words, it can be seen that Andy is an annoyance. However, the graphic at t...

 

            Jerry Craft’s New Kid has to be one of my favorite books we have read this semester—a descriptor I’ve handed out in the past, but this book runs away with the title due to its monumental achievement of making me laugh out loud, in real life, multiple times. Craft is able to convey so many nuances of the deeply problematic world of private school (speaking from experience) through the eyes of Jordan, whose narration is straight-to-the-point, funny, and true. The graphic novel medium offers so much opportunity for comedy, utilizing visual cues typically unavailable to a comedic novelist. For instance, early on in the story, as Jordan is just beginning to get a feel for his new school, he smiles at the sight of a Black man behind a steering wheel as he stands in a sea of white kids. This smile vanishes, accompanied by a cartoon frowny face, when the driver opens the car door to reveal a white student exiting the car, and...

  Joshua Singh I enjoyed reading New Kid by Jerry Craft, and I particularly resonated with being seen as “different” than others in a private school. I went to public school before going to a private high-school. The culture shock that Jordan experiences is similar to the one I did back in 9th grade. I find Craft’s use of incongruity theory and absurdity to critique private-school culture witty and clever. One of my favorite moments in the book is when Jordan first arrives at the school and sees that everyone is stuck up and pompous. He then sees Maury as an angelic figure, as Maury seems like an actual decent person. However, Maury is made fun of and called an Oreo because he is “White on the inside, Black on the outside” (Craft 26). My high-school’s students were predominately white, so I can relate to Jordan experiencing the refreshing sight of a fellow minority.  I can relate to how awkward the conversation was with his dad after he tells him about his first day of s...

I really enjoyed “New Kid” by Jerry Craft. I love how we visualize what’s occurring and how Jordan processes the info. It has a good balance between humor, advice, social commentary, and character complexity. Since it's a different mode of interaction, different character backgrounds can be explored and understood. An example of the balance is through his struggle to fit in. The humorous portion is him exclaiming “I’m Batman!” As he leaves the house, as the story progresses we see his struggle to fit in at school and in his neighborhood. It reminded me of Starr Carter in “The Hate You Give.”  I found humor in the play on words used for the chapter titles, the call-backs to previous scenes, and dynamics between some characters. I loved how Drew stands up to Ms. Rawle and proceeds to make her uncomfortable by playing into her stereotypes. Craft uses humorous dynamics to unveil ignorance and complexities of life. Throughout the book three similarities between characters are acknowledg...

    I especially enjoyed reading New Kid because of its ability to depict a school environment with which many of us can relate back to our own middle school experiences. As stated on the dedication page, Jerry Craft dedicates his comic book "to the Jordan Banks in all of us." The connection that so many of us are able to make with this text is evident that Craft's work has accomplished this goal of reaching audiences that can relate to feelings of newness, fear, isolation, and adjustment. Reading of Jordan's transition to his new school, RAD, truly put important issues into perspective for me - his anxieties and fears reminded me of the feelings that I experienced when moving from a small Catholic school to a large, public elementary school for first grade. Though this transition was difficult, I realize now how very privileged I was; I did not have to worry about other students mocking me or belittling me because of pieces of my identity such as race or background. ...

New Kid depicts the undeniable realities and discomforts of being in a new or unfamiliar environment. Although I have never been the new kid or struggled with being a minority in spaces that are primarily white, wealthy individuals, I am familiar with the sense of discomfort or aloneness that Jordan experiences as the New Kid. Every time I have made a significant transition, it has taken me a reasonable period to feel comfortable and have a sense of belonging. I am a junior here at Loyola and have only begun to feel stable in my position here as a student. It is undeniably frustrating and aggravating that no forces other than my concessions dictate this discomfort.  Jordan manages this unknowing and discomfort pretty well and talks to other people about what he is going through. However, it is especially hard for him because only a few people in RAD are in the same position as him, so others need help understanding. It is also complex with Jordan's parents because they have confli...

  Victoria Sabatino  Thoughts on New Kid  This reflection was almost too easy for me as I have also been a new kid and have gone through a culture shock. To be clear, I am not comparing the two stories as I was never a minority in the room and felt like the odd one out in that way, but being ‘new’ is not new to me.  In 9th grade (an already incredibly awkward time) I moved across the country and it sucked- it sucks less now. Not only that, I had to go through the culture shock of living in a new place and being surrounded by different people. You would not think that catholic all-girl high schools feel that different, but trust me they do.  Little things tallied up- different school lunches, the fact we had to be inside all day, snow days, uniforms- most of it was new and unknown. It is awkward being the odd one- people who were amazed that I had come from California. It was like I came from outer space.  I found the girls in New Jersey to be a lot ...

            I enjoyed reading New Kid by Jerry Craft. Jordan is an incredibly endearing main character, and I  found myself relating to his struggles adjusting to the wealthy private school culture. It was extremely  amusing when Liam says, "Mostly everyone shops at Graveyard Groves," (Craft 24) which is a play on  Vineyard Vines (an apparel company many of my former classmates purchased from regularly). Although  I have gone to private schools my whole life, I have not always been in the same socioeconomic class as  my classmates, and have also felt isolation based on race. Through Jordan, Craft makes very relevant  critiques of the private school industry, including issues surrounding financial aid, modern-day  segregation, and performative activism.           I found that the sense of humor that kids like Andy and the sophomores subscribed to was Hobbesian  in nature. T...

 I think Perry provides interesting insight into the world of humor by a male's standard of "edgy" comedy. Many older comedians rely on the fallback response of being "unafraid" to say divisive commentary and then presenting it on a platter disguised as comedy. The reality is that these people think that their insensitive views should be taken lightly and that low punches towards marginalized communities should be admitted by the masses. I have personally never watched any of Tyler Perry's work, mostly because I don't understand why he feels it's necessary to dress as a woman to add to his "comedy." It feels like a thinly veiled attempt to approach relatable comedy but to create a line of defense by creating a character to pin the insensitivity to. I don't really want to engage much with Perry's comedy, as it doesn't even approach the realm of humor to me and by engaging it would be encouraging. I'm already upset that I have...

Matthew Spear Dr. Juniper Ellis EN346D.01 Seminar: Humor Studies 3 April 2023 Tyler Perry’s Madea             Tyler Perry’s Madea is doubtlessly a di v isive character in popular culture. A black man playing a large, loud black woman via the medium of drag performance is likely to turn heads no matter the setting. However, the book “Don’t Make a Black Woman Take Off Her Earrings” offers a unique perspective on this character as well as the insights she might offer. When I began reading this text, I expected, frankly, some cheap and punchy toilet humor on the part of Tyler Perry in order to further cash in on his wildly successful Madea character. But the prose I discovered was far more developed, using comedy as a medium by which to show the good attributes and deep flaws of a character that Perry says was “inspired by his mother and aunt.” By keeping this inspiration in mind we as readers may be able to gleam more meaning...

       I understand why this book is in our class readings, however I can only point to just a few moments in the text that I thought were funny. I understand the goal of this class is not necessarily to make you laugh but to study humor, how it has changed, and how it is used and perceived in society. I thought Madea had some interesting and insightful remarks such as “You can’t protect your children from everything” when commenting on punishment and raising children. (Perry 82). One comment that I laughed at was, “My best subject was P.E. ‘Play and eat,’ that’s what it stands for” simply because I was not expecting this spin on the acronym (perry 89). But for the most part, there were so many ideas in this novel that I could not believe were being shared. In the foreword, Perry says that Madea is “not politically correct” (Perry viii). Further “people are so endeared to her because of her honesty” (Perry viii). Some of her honesty, though, really did not sit...