British comedy, global resistance

Russell Brand, Charlie Brooker and Stewart Lee

Bibliographic Data

ID6060674
AuthorsJames Brassett (0000-0001-7926-812X, University of Warwick, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume22
Issue1
Pages168-191
Publication date2016-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Journal of International Relations (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1354-0661 • E-ISSN: 1460-3713
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1354066115586816
OpenAlexW1899246390
LanguageEN
Citations received38
References cited36

The article provides a critical analysis of the possibilities and limits of comedy as a form of political resistance. Taking a cue from recent critiques of mainstream satire — that it profits from a cynical and easy criticism of political leaders — the article questions how comedy animates wider debates about political resistance in International Political Economy. The case is made for developing an everyday and cultural International Political Economy that treats resistance in performative terms, asking: what does it do? What possibilities and limits does it constitute? This approach is then read through a historical narrative of British comedy as a vernacular form of resistance that can (but does not necessarily) negotiate and contest hierarchies and exclusions in ‘particular’ and ‘particularly’ imaginative terms. In this vein, the work of Brand, Brooker and Lee is engaged as an important and challenging set of resistances to dominant forms of market subjectivity. Such comedy highlights the importance and ambiguity of affect, self-critique and ‘meaning’ in the politics of contemporary global markets

Aesthetics · Comedy · Hybridity · Literature · Media studies · Narrative · Performative utterance · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Subversion · Anthropology · Contemporary Literature and Criticism · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Law · Political and Economic history of UK and US

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