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From Politics to Comedy

A Comparative Analysis of Affiliative Audience Responses

University of York, United Kingdom

Peter Bull

University of York, United Kingdom

This study aims to identify key similarities and differences between the affiliative behaviors of audiences to political speakers and stand-up comedians. Four televised stand-up comedy routines were analyzed in terms of three dimensions: invitationality (whether the audience response is invited), rhetoricality (the use of rhetorical devices associated with audience applause), and synchrony (audience responses judged to commence either just before or immediately after the intended completion point of the speaker's utterance). Three different forms of asynchrony ("mismatches") were also identified, where the audience response was isolated, delayed, or interruptive. Stand-up comedians were found to invite similar proportions of affiliative audience responses to politicians, with comparable degrees of synchrony. However, they were less similar with regard to the rhetorical devices employed and the types of mismatch that occurred. Future investigations will focus on those aspects that are more specific to the genre of stand-up comedy.

Key Words: stand-up comedy • political speeches • laughter • rhetoric • speaker— audience interaction • public performance

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