[By Alysha Griffin]
The absence of black women as academic subjects in studies on humor does not mean that black women have sat cross-legged and silently watched while others slung of verbal insults. On the contrary, black women have developed their own brand of humor that undoubtedly fits into the larger tradition of African American humor. But, what exactly makes this brand unique is a question that must be posed with the study of black women’s humor in the same way that African American humor must be interrogated. By examining a select few works of novels by African American women in our collection, we hope to expose trends in novels that may be used to characterize black women’s humor.
There appear to be many trends throughout comedic works by women in African American humor. However, one glaring theme within the genre is the use of humor to address, expose, and/or cope with conflict within male-female relationships. Humor appears to be a way that black women resist patriarchal ideologies and systems of oppression like intimate violence and subjugation in the domestic sphere. This implies that humor is a medium through which women may address some of their most immediate concerns thereby upholding the feminist principle that the private is, indeed, political.
