LANGUAGE,LAUGHTER,AND IDENTITY:ANALYZING THE INTERSECTION OF LINGUISTIC CHOICES AND CULTURAL REPRESENTATION IN STAND-UP COMEDY

Abstract

This paper is a critique of cultural diversity and linguistic choices within the comedy of Abbas Bukhari and Akbar Choudhry by applying the lens of The General Theory of Verbal Humor (GTVH). This paper aims to analyze language, comedy and identity within the context of stand-up comedies. It emphasizes how these acts imprint or influences cultural settings in Pakistani society. Centered on the framework of GTVH, the paper focuses on comedy as a discursive practice. This paper incorporates a sample of 5 to 6 YouTube videos of stand-up comedy by Bukhari and Choudhry. Further, this paper does textual analyses of the content of Pakistani comedians from their performances to present cultural values in them. Moreover, this study contributes to current knowledge regarding the elements of theory such as language, logical mechanism, situation, target audience and narrative strategy. Eventually, this paper enhances the understanding of how comedians build their personalities and relate to their audiences by focusing on the use of language, dialects, slang and code-switching. This study is significant as it looks at how humor works as a signifying system for cultural critique and identity management especially in the context of Pakistan.