Chris Kramer

Marquette University
Rock Valley College
Marquette University
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 2015
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States of America
  •  1263
    World-Traveling, Double Consciousness, and Laughter
    Israeli Journal for Humor Research 2 (6): 93-119. 2017.
    In this paper I borrow from Maria Lugones’ work on playful “world-traveling” and W.E.B. Du Bois’ notion of “double consciousness” to make the case that humor can facilitate an openness and cooperative attitude among an otherwise closed, even adversarial audience. I focus on what I call “subversive” humor, that which is employed by or on behalf of those who have been continually marginalized. When effectively used, such humor can foster the inclination and even desire to listen to others and, if …Read more
  •  628
    Parrhesia, Humor, and Resistance
    Israeli Journal of Humor Research 9 (1): 22-46. 2020.
    This paper begins by taking seriously former slave and abolitionist Frederick Douglass’ response in his What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? to systematic violence and oppression. He claims that direct argumentation is not the ideal mode of resistance to oppression: “At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed.” I will focus on a few elements of this playful mode of resistance that conflict with the more straightforward strivings for abstract, universal, objectiv…Read more
  •  449
    Dave Chappelle's Positive Propaganda
    In Mark Ralkowski (ed.), Dave Chappelle and Philosophy, Popular Culture and Philosophy. pp. 75-88. 2021.
    Some of Dave Chappelle’s uses of storytelling about seemingly mundane events, like his experiences with his “white friend Chip” and the police, are examples of what W.E.B. Du Bois calls “Positive Propaganda.” This is in contrast to “Demagoguery,” the sort of propaganda described by Jason Stanley that obstructs empathic recognition of others, and undermines reasonable debate among citizens regarding policies that matter: the justice system, welfare, inequality, and race, for example. Some of Chap…Read more
  •  308
    "The Mind is not a Vessel to be Filled but a Fire to be Kindled", and "Education is Not the Filling of Pail But the Lighting of a Fire", and ... Something About a Horse ... You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it smile? Because of the long face and all? (No, that can’t be it). Anyway, borrowing a bit from Plutarch and Yeats (maybe, there is no agreement on whether he said that about pails and fires), and some idiom from 12th Century Old English about horses walking on water, I assum…Read more
  •  292
    Which Direction Do We Punch: The Powers and Perils of Humour Against the New Conspiracism
    In Rashi Bhargava & Richa Chilana (eds.), Punching Up in Stand-Up Comedy, Routledge Chapman & Hall. pp. 235-254. 2022.
    This chapter will evaluate humor used with the specific intent to reveal glaring epistemic errors that lead to injustice; flaws in reasoning so transparent that straightforward logic, argument, and evidence seem ineffectual against them, and in some cases, just silly to think such tools would be needed. Laughter seems to be one of the only sane responses. In particular, I will assess how humor can combat conspiracy theories, propaganda, lies, and bullshit. The last one I view in Harry Frankfurt'…Read more
  •  28
    A Wise Person Proportions Their Beliefs With Humor
    The Philosophy of Humor Yearbook 2 (1): 141-143. 2021.
    “Just as philosophy begins with doubt, so also a life that may be called human begins with irony” (Kierkegaard The Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to Socrates, pg.6, thesis XV) What has proportion to do with humor or irony? And what do either of these have to do with being human? Jokes, laughter, and funniness connote excess, exaggeration, incongruity, dissonance, etc., the opposite of proportion--balance, symmetry, Aristotle’s golden mean. Yet, The Philosopher maintains, the wit has f…Read more
  •  23
    Mark Twain’s Serious Humor and That Peculiar Institution: Christianity
    In Alan H. Goldman (ed.), Mark Twain and Philosophy, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. pp. 125-136. 2017.
    According to Manuel Davenport, “The best humorists--Mark Twain, Will Rogers, Bob Hope, and Mort Sahl--share [a] mixture of detachment and desire, eagerness to believe, and irreverence concerning the possibility of certainty. And when they become serious about their convictions--as Twain did about colonialism…they cease to be humorous” (p. 171). I agree with the first part, but not the second. Humor does require disengagement, but not completely such that one has no emotional interest in the subj…Read more
  •  10
    As If: Connecting Phenomenology, Mirror Neurons, Empathy, and Laughter
    Phaenex: Journal of Existential and Phenomenological Theory and Culture 7 (1). 2012.
    The discovery of mirror neurons in both primates and humans has led to an enormous amount of research and speculation as to how conscious beings are able to interact so effortlessly among one another. Mirror neurons might provide an embodied basis for passive synthesis and the eventual process of further communalization through empathy, as envisioned by Edmund Husserl. I consider the possibility of a phenomenological and scientific investigation of laughter as a point of connection that might in…Read more