Jokes and their Relations to Society

This title is an historical and sociological study of humour and jokes, covering almost every continent and reaching back in time to medieval jokes in Europe and jokes about the Melanesians in Ancient Greece. In particular this is a study of ethnic jokes, sick jokes, political jokes and urban legends.

Résumé
Frontmatter -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- Chapter 1. Introduction -- Chapter 2. Fooltowns: Traditional and modern Local, regional and ethnic jokes about stupidity -- Chapter 3. From the Milesians to the Milesians: The Irish-Pontian joke, its history and its absence in China and Japan -- Chapter 4. The Protestant ethic and the comic spirit of capitalism -- Chapter 5. Stupidity and rationality: Jokes from the iron cage -- Chapter 6. Humour for the future and a future for humour -- Chapter 7. Ethnic jokes about alcohol: A study of the humour of ambivalence -- Chapter 8. Nasty legends, sick humour and ethnic jokes about stupidity -- Chapter 9. Making fun of work: Humour as sociology in the humorous writings of H. G. Wells -- Chapter 10. Conclusion -- Notes -- References -- Index