There are many jokes about disability. In the media, people with disabilities appear increasingly in comic contexts, e.g. in (partially award-winning) film comedies such as Colegas (Brazil 2013), Campeones (Spain 2018), Die Goldfische (Germany 2019) or The Peanut butter falcon (USA 2019). Disability is also common in caricature. However, up to now, methodically based studies or even overarching theories on the field of research ‚comedy and disability‘ have been almost completely lacking in international research.

But especially in discussions about inclusion, questions about the potential of laughter and comedy as well as their ambivalence are of central importance, because laughter can be in- and excluding. One laughs because of and despite the disability, over and with the affected people.

Laughter involves, on the one hand, a moment of distance and dissociation, but at the same time also the relation to a social group and thus indicates affiliation. But there is no objective criterion for when and under which conditions comedy turns into violence and cruelty, liberating distancing into stigmatization and social exclusion.

The aim of the conference is to analyse the ambivalence of comic depictions of disability in fictional texts, films and scenic representations as well as the ambivalence of the reception. The aim is to describe precisely which type of comics is used and which ‚laughter communities‘ arise as a result. The following topics are planned:

• Analysis of comical representations of disability in concrete case studies in different media and different cultural contexts;
• Analysis of the function of the body(s) as the intersection of the social and the symbolic aspect;
• Formulation and processing of ethical and normative questions about ‚good‘ or ‚bad‘ laughter about disability;
• Attempt to draw the line between inclusion and exclusion through laughter.

The event will be held completely in Spanish.