Humour and Comedy in Digital Game Live Streaming

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12656845
AutoresM R Johnson (0000-0003-4622-650X, The University of Sydney, autor correspondente)
Ano2022
Volume26
Fascículo6
Páginas3045-3067
Data de publicação2022-06-07
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoNew Media & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1461-4448 • E-ISSN: 1461-7315
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/14614448221095160
OpenAlexW4281762240
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas17
Referências citadas55

This article considers the nature and functions of humour in digital game live streaming on Twitch. Most streamers and viewers seem uncomfortable with ‘serious’ in-game narrative content, resulting in weighty or emotional moments in games becoming sources of comedy and humour. Many also subvert the platform’s power dynamics by mocking community standards or the possibility of being banned, while some go even further and treat streamers themselves as fair game for mockery. This article thus examines how the humour of play, games and the Internet combine and evolve in an emerging and distinctive ‘stream-humour’, which can be sometimes playful and supportive yet sometimes shade into antagonism, rule-bending and hostility. Examining these dynamics on Twitch, in turn, provides a valuable window into how platform infrastructures and cultures generate norms and cultures of humour and amusement, and strengthens our understanding of online communities and platform power in this and similar contexts

Aesthetics · Amusement · Art · Comedy · Literature · Live Streaming · Media studies · Multimedia · Narrative · Power (physics · Sociology · Video game · Visual arts · Computer Science · Digital Games and Media · Impact of Technology on Adolescents · Psychology · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology · Social Psychology