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F—k the Police! And on the Other Hand . . .: African American Comedy, Ambivalence, and Anti-Carceral Critique
Book chapter

F—k the Police! And on the Other Hand . . .: African American Comedy, Ambivalence, and Anti-Carceral Critique

Jakeya Caruthers
The Oxford Handbook of African American Humor Studies, pp 70-88
10 Nov 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/9780197751046.003.0005
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Abstract

Film Theory and Criticism HUMOR Literary Studies (African American Literature) Literary Studies (American) Literary Studies (Fiction, Novelists, and Prose Writers) literary Studies (Poetry and Poets) Literary Criticism
This chapter examines the complex and contradictory ways Black political comedians approach questions of race and criminalization. While critique of the criminal legal system is a frequent feature of film and stage comedy produced by progressive Black humorists, there are times when these comedians’ anti-carceral analyses and proposals broach more radical visions and times when they take a more conservative stance. This chapter explores how these conflicting approaches are not only a matter of ideological ambivalence but, given the ways in which radical anti-carcerality or abolition demands an embrace of thought—and jokes—taken to the ludic limit, these comedians’ commitments to a political affect and comedic aesthetic of “cool pessimism” may account for such vacillation across bits.

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