Just Kidding? Humour, identity and the politics of offence in 21st -century Flemish humour controversies

Humour is often trivialised as “just a joke,” yet humour controversies have become recurring flashpoints in Western European public discourse, crystallising broader tensions around identity, belonging, and cultural change. This dissertation foregrounds the ‘politics of offence’: the power-laden processes through which offence claims are voiced, contested, and (de)legitimised in the public sphere. To address key gaps in critical humour research, the study combines (descriptive) quantitative, qualitative, and creative methods, foregrounding two key empirical strands: a longitudinal analysis of 290 humour controversies in Flemish news media (1998–2022) and audience research with young Flemish Muslims, primarily with Moroccan and Turkish diasporic backgrounds. This multi-method design situates (offensive) humour as both a public arena of cultural negotiation and an everyday practice of identity-formation. The dissertation advances three key contributions. First, it shows how (mediated) humour controversies expose deep asymmetries in the politics of offence, structured by racial and religious hierarchies. Second, it highlights humour’s centrality to the emotional politics of Western European societies, where majority emotions are (re)centred and minority ones are frequently pathologised or dismissed. Third, it develops humour as a reflexive method, revealing how laughter, discomfort, and role reversal illuminate dynamics of whiteness and belonging in both public discourse and research practice.