Cheeky Fictions

"Cheeky Fictions draws attention to an area in postcolonial theory that has been neglected and keeps its promise of connecting insightful critical readings of postcolonial laughter across its differences while proving to be quite an enjoyable and chuckle-provoking read." - in: Anglistik, Vol. 18, No. 1 (2007)"…the volume is a valuable contribution to postcolonial studies. A wide variety of literatures and other media is covered and the intended diversity is indeed a strength of the book, underlining the richness of postcolonial literatures and discourses." - in: Archiv, Vol. 244, No. 1 (2007)

• Susanne REICHL/Mark STEIN: IntroductionI. Laughter’s double vision – Humour and cultural ambiguityUlrike ERICHSEN: Smiling in the face of adversity: How to use humour to defuse cultural conflictAnthony ILONA: ‘Laughing through the tears’: Mockery and self-representation in V.S. Naipaul’s A House for Mr Biswas and Earl Lovelace’s The Dragon Can’t DanceVirginia RICHTER: Laughter and aggression: Desire and derision in a postcolonial contextHelga RAMSEY-KURZ: Humouring the terrorists or the terrorised? Militant Muslims in Salman Rushdie, Zadie Smith, and Hanif KureishiII. Traditions and transgressions – Writing back and forthHeinz ANTOR: Postcolonial laughter in Canada: Mordecai Richler’s The Incomparable AtukSusan LEVER: The colonizer’s gift of cursing: Satire in David Foster’s MoonliteMichael MEYER: Swift and Sterne revisited: Postcolonial parodies in Rushdie and Singh-ToorDetlef GOHRBANDT: After-laughter, or the comedy of decline: Ronald Searle’s critique of postwar Englishness in The Rake’s ProgressIII. Ethnic cabaret – A license to laugh?Mita BANERJEE: Queer laughter: Shyam Selvadurai’s Funny Boy and the normative as comicAstrid FELLNER/Klaus HEISSENBERGER: ‘I was born in East L.A.’: Humour and the displacement of nationality and ethnicity Christiane SCHLOTE: ‘The sketch’s the thing wherein we’ll catch the conscience of the audience’: Strategies and pitfalls of ethnic TV comedies in Britain, the United States, and GermanyIV. The language of humour – The humour of languageMargit OZVALDA: Worlds apart: Schools in postcolonial Indian fictionSusanne PICHLER: Interculturality and humour in Timothy Mo’s Sour SweetSusanne MÜHLEISEN: What makes an accent funny, and why? Black British Englishes and humour televisedV. Laughing it off – Does therapeutic humour work?Maggie Ann BOWERS: ‘Ethnic glue’: Humour in Native American literaturesAnnie GAGIANO: Using a comic vision to contend with tragedy: Three unusual African English novelsGisela FEURLE: Madam & Eve – Ten Wonderful Years: A cartoon strip and its role in post-apartheid South AfricaWendy WOODWARD: Laughing back at the kingfisher: Zakes Mda’s The Heart of Redness and postcolonial humourIndexContributors