[Commlist] The Pragmatics of Cringe Humor on the Screen and on Digital Media

***Call for Papers****
The Pragmatics of Cringe Humor on the Screen and on Digital Media*
International Conference
University Paul-Valéry Montpellier 3
May 4th-5th, 2023

*Keynote speakers:* Pr. Marta Dynel (Łodź University, Poland), Pr. 
Alexander Brock (Martin-Luther Universität Halle Wittenberg, Germany) 
and Pr. Salvatore Attardo (Texas A&M University, USA—via Zoom)*
*

*Organizing Committee:* Dr. Lynn Blin, Dr. Virginie Iché, Dr. Célia 
Schneebeli

             This conference intends to examine the pragmatics of 
cringe humor in the English language on the screen (in sitcoms, TV 
series, filmed stand-up comedies, films etc.) and on digital media (in 
audiovisual, textual or multimodal forms). “Cringe humor” should not be 
taken as yet another coinage to be added to the long list of terms 
already used to account for humorous phenomena (as Attardo puts it 
(2020, 8), “there is no reason to coin a new term if there is a 
perfectly good one already”). Indeed, Schwind uses the expression 
“embarrassment humor” (2015) and Schwanebeck, in his introduction to his 
special issue devoted to painful laughter (2021), refers to the 
expression “cringe humor” along with Moore’s “comedy of discomfort” 
(2007). However, the widespread use of “cringe humor” since the success 
of Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s BBC mockumentary sitcom, /The 
Office/ (BBC Two, 2001-2002) as well as of the hashtag #cringe on 
digital media pleads for retaining this term over others. “Cringe humor” 
points to the specific embodied reactions to cringeworthy/humorous 
contents found both on the screen and on digital media, i.e., “an 
involuntary inward shiver of embarrassment, awkwardness, disgust” (OED), 
“shudder and discomfort” (Schwind 2015, 67), “psychic unease” or 
“physical pain” (Duncan 2017, 37), and even “intense visceral reaction” 
(Dahl 2018, 19).

             Cringe humor has originally been associated with the small 
screen (the best known examples being /The Office/ BBC Two, 2001-2003; 
/The Office/ NBC, 2005-2013; /I’m Alan Partridge/ BBC Two, 1997-2022; 
/South Park/ Comedy Central, 1997-; /Da Ali G Show/ Channel 4, 2000; 
/Curb Your Enthusiasm/ HBO, 2000-; /Louie/ FX, 2000-2015; /Nighty-Night/ 
BBC Three, 2004-2005; /Crazy Ex-Girlfriend/ The CW, 2015-2019; /Haters 
Back Off/ Netflix, 2016-2017…) and stand-up comedies (with stand-up 
comedians such as Louis CK, Dave Chappelle, Lisa Lampanelli, Margaret 
Cho, Hannah Gadsby). These sitcoms, TV series and filmed stand-up 
comedies (and others) can all be analyzed through the lens of cringe 
humor because of their sensitive subject matter (sex, sex orientation, 
gender, race, disability, aging, mental health, death, …), their form 
(in particular, their repeated use of silence, pauses, the absence of 
laugh track, the use of extreme close-up shots, the direct addresses to 
the audience whether on screen or beyond the screen…) and/or the type of 
awkward relationship created with the viewers, often based on 
“differentials in perception and affect among filmmaker, subject, and 
spectator” (Middleton 2014, 26).

Cringe humor seems to be less typically associated with the big screen, 
but many documentaries have been said to have taken “the awkward turn” 
(Middleton, 2014)—Rob Reiner’s 1984 /This is Spinal Tap/, Michael 
Moore’s 1989 /Roger and Me/, Larry Charles’s 2006 /Borat /being three 
examples of such cringey mockumentaries)—and movies (in particular black 
comedies) do include what Schwanebeck calls “cringe elements” 
(2021)—Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 /Dr. Strangelove/, Todd Solondz’s 1998 
/Happiness/, Jason Reitman’s 2005 /Thank You for Smoking/, the Coen 
brothers’ 2008 /Burn After Reading/ and Roman Polanski’s 2011 /Carnage/ 
specifically coming to mind.

             Cringe humor seems to have expanded into various 
directions on the Internet and social media, where a multitude of 
cringeworthy but humorous content can be found:

- YouTube channels such as Miranda Sings, the cringe-inducing alter-ego 
of actress Colleen Ballinger, or multiple channels specializing in 
reaction videos, pranks and FAIL videos,

- Twitter accounts such as “cringe worthy tweets”, “images that are 
unbelievably cringe”, or more simply Twitter posts which bear the 
hashtag #cringe,

- blogs and micro-blogs (for instance Tumblr blogs or more specialized 
blogs such as Awkward Family Photos, People of Walmart) that collect 
pictures presented simultaneously as funny and cringeworthy,

- humorous content websites (Cheezburger, Bored Panda, Buzzfeed) that 
list “awkward moments” in life and embarrassing anecdotes or ideas that 
people share with their community of viewers for the sake of entertainment,

- satire and parody websites (such as /The Onion/) where cringe humor 
borders on black humor and / or the politically incorrect,

- “RoastMe” subreddit, where users post selfies for other users to 
“humorously mock or humiliate” them with a “well-timed joke, diss or 
comeback” (as defined in the “about” section of RoastMe).

The conference is predicated on the idea that two levels of 
communication (at least) need to be taken into account when one analyzes 
discourse mediated on the screen or computer-mediated discourse, and 
that cringe humor may pervade all these interactional levels. Film 
discourse relies both on the “inter-character/characters’ 
(communicative) level” and the “recipient’s (communicative) level, on 
which meanings are communicated to the viewer” (Dynel 2011, 49). Brock 
terms these levels Communicative Level 2 (the level of the characters’ 
communication) and Communicative Level 1 (the level of the collective 
sender’s communication with the viewer) to emphasize the primacy of CL1 
over CL2 in terms of what he calls “real level of communication” (2015, 
30). Thus, film discourse can comprise interactions that some characters 
deem cringeworthy and humorous and/or communicate in a 
cringeworthy/humorous way with the viewers.

Computer-mediated communication may involve more communicative levels, 
with, notably, YouTube videos including the additional level of comments 
(Dynel 2014, 50), on which third parties may interact in a 
cringeworthy/humorous way with the speaker and other parties regarding 
the cringeworthy/humorous content posted. Blogs, micro-blogs and content 
websites sometimes involve initial interactions between two or more 
speakers, which are later discussed in the comment section, to emphasize 
their humorous side, to reject them as too cringey or to exchange jibes 
with other Internet users—playfully “roasting” them but sometimes going 
as far as “burning them” (Dynel 2020).

Cringe humor relies on a delicate balance between the negatively 
connoted “cringe” and the positively connoted “humor”. What does it take 
then to turn cringe into humor and make the awkward become funny or vice 
versa? According to the Incongruity-Resolution model of humor (Suls 
1972, 1983, Shultz 1972), humorousness relies upon unexpected 
associations that go against “our normal mental patterns and 
expectations” (Hye-Knudsen 2018: 15). What is more, according to the 
Benign Violation theory (Warren and McGraw 2015), which builds upon the 
incongruity theory, the violation of our expectations that is necessary 
for humor “must have a negative valence instead of simply departing 
incongruously from one’s expectations or mental patterns, hence why 
slipping on a banana peel is often considered humorous while winning the 
lottery is not.” (Hye-Knudsen, 2018: 15). However, most violations do 
not make people laugh. The Benign Violation theory holds that to remain 
humorous, those violations have to remain benign, which is why they stop 
being funny if they are too threatening, too aggressive, or too serious. 
Yet, if they are too benign, do they still make people cringe? One of 
the goals of the conference will therefore be to determine when cringe 
humor fails or succeeds and to identify the “felicity conditions” for 
cringe humor on the screen and on digital media (pauses, intonation, 
facial expressions, illocutionary force markers online such as emoji, 
emoticons, GIFs…)—and whether these (or some of these) felicity 
conditions hold for both media or are media-specific.

The conference will also address the issue of the politeness of cringe 
humor in English (or lack thereof) on the screen and on digital media. 
Humor has been interpreted as one of the strategies of politeness, 
speakers engaging in humorous interactions claiming common ground, which 
can be seen as a form of positive politeness (Brown and Levinson 1987, 
103-104; Attardo 2020, 274). However, cringe humor seems to complicate 
and potentially destabilize interactions at all communicative levels. If 
cringe humor is meant to “enhance the rapport” with the other speaker 
and/or the audience (see Spencer-Oatey 2000, 2005 on 
“rapport-management”), how can we account for its physical 
manifestations? If, alternatively, cringe humor unintentionally or 
deliberately aggravates the rapport with the other speaker/the audience, 
how can we account for its success? Is cringe humor meant to create “an 
in-group perception for the speaker and the addressee(s)” or “an 
out-group division between the speaker and (some members of) the 
audience” (Attardo 2020, 277)? In other words, what (mis)alignment 
between the speaker and the addressee(s) is involved in cringeworthy and 
humorous content, and to what effect? Are addressee(s) expected to 
empathize with the target of cringe humor (and bond with them—in keeping 
with what Billig after Goffman (2001, 27) calls the ‘nice-guy’ theory of 
embarrassment) or sneer at them (and distance themselves from them as 
highlighted by Kanzler) or both? Do addressee(s) tend to approve or 
disapprove of the speaker’s use of cringe humor on CL1, and for what 
reason(s)? Do they feel cringe humor is meant to reinforce and 
perpetuate stereotypes or denounce and satirize them (Tsakona 2017)? Can 
there be, therefore, such a thing as an ethics of cringe humor?

The following topics and questions may be approached, the list not being 
exhaustive:

• cringe humor vs. failed humor (Bell 2015): the felicity conditions of 
cringe humor in English language on the screen and on digital media,

• the discrepancy between the presence of cringe humor between 
characters (CL2) vs. the lack of cringe humor on the recipient’s level 
(CL1) or vice versa,

• the cumulated effect of the presence of cringe humor on both CL2 and CL1,

• the dissemination of cringe humor from the initial post on digital 
media to the comment section and its pragmatic effects on the various 
speakers involved

• the (im)politeness and ethics of cringe humor on the screen and on 
digital media—whether on CL2 or CL1, or both,

• the distancing/bonding effect of cringe humor; cringe humor and empathy,

• comparative approaches: cringe humor on the big screen/small screen 
vs. computer-mediated cringe humor,

• multimodal approaches to cringe humor,

• diachronic approaches to cringe humor: is present-day cringe humor 
more rapport-aggravating or rapport-enhancing?

• the impact of the mode of diffusion (cinema, TV screen, VOD, streaming 
sites, website, social media) on the type of cringe humor and/or the 
reaction of the addressee(s),

• the reception of cringe humor: generational / gendered / sociocultural 
/ historical perspectives.

*Deadline for submission*: November 20, 2022

*Notification of acceptance*: January 10, 2023

*Proposals* of around 400 words (along with a short bio-bibliographical 
notice, no longer than 100 words) to be sent to 
(cringehumor2023 /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(cringehumor2023 /at/ gmail.com)>

*Language of the conference*: English

A selection of papers will be considered for publication after 
double-blind peer-review.

*Registration fees*: 50 euros (30 euros for PhD candidates)

*Advisory Board :*

Salvatore Attardo (Texas A&M University, USA)

Monika Bednarek (University of Sydney, Australia)

Kristy Beers Fägersten (Södertörn University, Sweden)

Alexander Brock (Martin-Luther Universität, Germany)

Jan Chovanec (Masaryk University, Czech Republic)

Miriam Locher (University of Basel, Switzerland)

Thomas Messerli (University of Basel, Switzerland)

Will Noonan (Université de Bourgogne, France)

Valeria Sinkeviciute (University of Queensland, Australia)

Sandrine Sorlin (Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3, France)

Villy Tsakona (University of Athens, Greece)

  Tuija Virtanen (Åbo Akademi University, Finland)

*References*

Attardo, Salvatore. /The Linguistics of Humor. An Introduction/. OUP, 2020.

Bergson, Henri. /Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic./ 
Translated by Cloudesley Brereton & Fred Rothwell, Floating Press, 2008 
[1914].

Billig, Michael. “Humour and Embarrassment. Limits of ‘Nice-Guy’ 
Theories of Social Life”. /Theory, Culture and Society/, vol. 18, no. 5, 
2001, pp. 23-43.

---, /Laughter and Ridicule: Towards a Social Critique of Humor/. Sage 
Publications, 2005.

Brock, Alexander. “Participation Frameworks and Participation in 
Televised Sitcom, Candid Camera and Stand-up Comedy”. /Participation in 
Public and Social Media Interactions/. Edited by Marta Dynel and Jan 
Chovanec, John Benjamins, 2015, pp. 27-47.

---. 2016. “The Borders of Humorous Intent – The Case of TV Comedies”. 
/Journal of Pragmatics/, vol. 95, 2016, pp. 58-66.

Brown, Penelope and Stephen C. Levinson. /Politeness. Some Universals in 
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Dahl, Melissa. /Cringeworthy. A Theory of Awkwardness/. 
Portfolio/Penguin, 2018.

Duncan, Pansy. “Joke Work: Comic Labor and the Aesthetics of the 
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Dynel, Marta. “Stranger than Fiction. A Few Methodological Notes on 
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---. “Participation Framework Underlying YouTube Interaction.” /Journal 
of Pragmatics/, vol. 73, 2014, pp. 37-52.

---. “On Being Roasted, Toasted and Burned: (Meta)pragmatics of Wendy’s 
Twitter Humour”. /Journal of Pragmatics/, vol. 166, 2020, pp. 1-14.

Gantar, Jure./The Pleasure of Fools. /McGill/Queens UP, 2005.

Gray, Frances. “Privacy, Embarrassment and Social Power: British 
Sitcom.” /Beyond a Joke: The Limits of Humour/. Edited by Michael 
Pickering and Sharon Lockyer. Macmillan, 2009, pp. 148–64.

Grice, Herbert Paul. “Logic and Conversation”. /Syntax and Semantics 3: 
Speech Acts/. Edited by Peter Cole and Jerry L. Morgan, Academic Press, 
1975, pp. 41-58.

Hye-Knudsen, Marc. “Painfully Funny: Cringe Comedy, Benign Masochism, 
and Not-So-Benign Violations.” /Leviathan: Interdisciplinary Journal in 
English/, 2018, no. 2, pp. 13-31.

Kanzler, Katja. “The Cringe and the Sneer: Structures of Feeling in 
/Veep/.” /Humanities/, vol. 10, no. 4, 2021, pp. 114.

Kotsko, Adam. /Awkwardness: An Essay/. Zero Books, 2010.

Middleton, Jason. /Documentary’s Awkward Turn. Cringe Comedy and Media 
Spectatorship/. Routledge, 2014.

Moore, Heidi R. /The Aesthetics of Place and the Comedy of Discomfort: 
Six Humorists/. UMI Microform, 2007.

Shultz, Thomas R. “The Role of Incongruity and Resolution in Children’s 
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Schwanebeck, Wieland. “Introduction to Painful Laughter: Media and 
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Schwind, Kai Hanno. “Like Watching a Motorway Crash: Exploring the 
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Seewoester Cain, Sarah. “Teasing as Audience Engagement”. /The Dynamics 
of Interactional Humor/. Edited by Villy Tsakona and Jan Chovanec. John 
Benjamins, 2019, pp.127–52.

Spencer-Oatey, Helen ed. /Culturally Speaking. Culture, Communication 
and Politeness Theory/. Continuum, 2000.

---. “(Im)Politeness, Face and Perceptions of Rapport: Unpacking their 
Bases and Interrelationships”. /Journal of Politeness Research/, vol. 1, 
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Suls, Jerry. “A Two-Stage Model for the Appreciation of Jokes and 
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81-100.

---. (1983). “Cognitive Processes in Humor Appreciation.” /Handbook of 
Humor Research Vol. I/. Edited by P. McGhee and J. Goldstein. Springer 
Verlag, 1983, pp. 39-57.

Tsakona, Villy. “Humor Research and Humor Reception: Far Away, So 
Close”. /Humorous Discourse/. Edited by Wladyslaw Chlopicki and Dorota 
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Warren, Caleb and Peter McGraw, Peter. “Benign Violations: Making 
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pp. 1141–9.


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