2024.10.14 : View this Review Online | View Recent NDPR Reviews
David Shoemaker, Wisecracks: Humor and Morality in Everyday Life, University of Chicago Press, 2024, 256pp., $25.00 (pbk), ISBN 9780226832982.
Reviewed by Steven Gimbel, Gettysburg College
Alfred Wegener formulated the theory of plate tectonics, despite not being a geologist. Sometimes a new voice with a new perspective can help a discourse community see things differently. That is the goal of David Shoemaker’s book Wisecracks: Humor and Morality in Everyday Life. A newcomer to the conversation in humor ethics, Shoemaker seeks an Aristotelian middle-ground between what he sees as the prigs and buffoons who control the current discussion with positions that are extreme in being either too restrictive or too permissive. His account succeeds in providing a valuable book worth discussing as it ultimately finds a mean between vacuity and insightfulness.
While the book does not bring tectonic shifts to the discussions around humor theory and humor ethics, it does begin with a…
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