Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque

The Arab Spring offered Egyptians a brief opportunity for political freedom of expression; it also offered many creative youths a chance to experiment with their newfound digital talents. However, this was soon followed by a state crackdown on public forms of dissent; subsequently, creative express...

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Autor principal:	Yomna Elsayed
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Cracow Tertium Society for the Promotion of Language Studies 2021
Materias:	Arab Spring carnival Egypt Facebook politics Language and Literature P
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/4e10070d5f114a8694ac0c6b527d4b48
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id	oai:doaj.org-article:4e10070d5f114a8694ac0c6b527d4b48
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:4e10070d5f114a8694ac0c6b527d4b482021-11-05T08:50:06ZEgyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque10.7592/EJHR2021.9.3.5312307-700Xhttps://doaj.org/article/4e10070d5f114a8694ac0c6b527d4b482021-11-01T00:00:00Zhttps://europeanjournalofhumour.org/ejhr/article/view/531https://doaj.org/toc/2307-700X The Arab Spring offered Egyptians a brief opportunity for political freedom of expression; it also offered many creative youths a chance to experiment with their newfound digital talents. However, this was soon followed by a state crackdown on public forms of dissent; subsequently, creative expression had to find other platforms and modalities to continue its practices of playful dissent. Through Mikhail Bakhtin’s (1984) theory of Carnivalesque, this paper examines how Egyptian youths managed to create alternate spaces, other than the highly scrutinised political square, to challenge officialdom and generate their own folk culture through laughter and creative digital arts. This research is based on interviews conducted with administrators and fans of Facebook pages that offer satirical content in the form of memes and remix videos. Fans of these pages mostly belong to the 1980s and 1990s generations, but they also include younger adults whose formative years were those of the Arab Spring. This study argues that, like Bakhtin’s carnival, laughter and everyday comedy was a means by which creative artists could continue to express their opinions and indirect dissent amid intensifying state surveillance. These spaces, therefore, constituted third spaces away from polarised politics, where fans could playfully discuss the comedy away from the heat of events. They were spaces where youths could exercise control over the objects of laughter and challenge established institutions. Like the carnival, youths exercised Carnival practices of both reversal and renewal to craft a new folk culture of their own that did not have to abide by the rules of patronising politics. Yomna ElsayedCracow Tertium Society for the Promotion of Language StudiesarticleArab SpringcarnivalEgyptFacebookpoliticsLanguage and LiteraturePENThe European Journal of Humour Research, Vol 9, Iss 3 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Arab Spring carnival Egypt Facebook politics Language and Literature P
spellingShingle	Arab Spring carnival Egypt Facebook politics Language and Literature P Yomna Elsayed Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
description	The Arab Spring offered Egyptians a brief opportunity for political freedom of expression; it also offered many creative youths a chance to experiment with their newfound digital talents. However, this was soon followed by a state crackdown on public forms of dissent; subsequently, creative expression had to find other platforms and modalities to continue its practices of playful dissent. Through Mikhail Bakhtin’s (1984) theory of Carnivalesque, this paper examines how Egyptian youths managed to create alternate spaces, other than the highly scrutinised political square, to challenge officialdom and generate their own folk culture through laughter and creative digital arts. This research is based on interviews conducted with administrators and fans of Facebook pages that offer satirical content in the form of memes and remix videos. Fans of these pages mostly belong to the 1980s and 1990s generations, but they also include younger adults whose formative years were those of the Arab Spring. This study argues that, like Bakhtin’s carnival, laughter and everyday comedy was a means by which creative artists could continue to express their opinions and indirect dissent amid intensifying state surveillance. These spaces, therefore, constituted third spaces away from polarised politics, where fans could playfully discuss the comedy away from the heat of events. They were spaces where youths could exercise control over the objects of laughter and challenge established institutions. Like the carnival, youths exercised Carnival practices of both reversal and renewal to craft a new folk culture of their own that did not have to abide by the rules of patronising politics.
format	article
author	Yomna Elsayed
author_facet	Yomna Elsayed
author_sort	Yomna Elsayed
title	Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
title_short	Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
title_full	Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
title_fullStr	Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
title_full_unstemmed	Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque
title_sort	egyptian facebook satire: a post-spring carnivalesque
publisher	Cracow Tertium Society for the Promotion of Language Studies
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/4e10070d5f114a8694ac0c6b527d4b48
work_keys_str_mv	AT yomnaelsayed egyptianfacebooksatireapostspringcarnivalesque
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Egyptian Facebook satire: a post-Spring carnivalesque

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