"A Good Story": On Black Abjection in Improv Comedy

Authors

  • Michel Büch Bremen Black Studies University of Bremen

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5283/copas.178

Keywords:

Improv, Blackness, abjection, White, Whiteness, Black, Modernity, Critique, improvisation, theater, The Second City, Performance

Abstract

This paper discusses Black absence in Improv Comedy as a symptom for the racial exclusion inherent in Humanism. Critiquing Enlightenment thought as the epistemological basis for Improv's liberatory and democratic ideals, I engage in deconstructive play with one of the era's central literary motifs, the Doppelgänger“. I analyze Improv as a particular symptom of White aesthetic, cultural, and political hegemony.

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Published

2014-06-08

How to Cite

Büch, Michel. “‘A Good Story’: On Black Abjection in Improv Comedy”. Current Objectives of Postgraduate American Studies, vol. 15, no. 1, June 2014, doi:10.5283/copas.178.

Issue

Vol. 15 No. 1 (2014)

Section

Articles

License

Creative Commons License

Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work’s authorship and initial publication in this journal.