The uncomfortable joke: disability humour as sub-cultural resistance in Indian stand-up comedy

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Disability has been used in several movies and literary texts as a metaphor to instigate laughter. In contemporary times, Stand-up comedy acts as a dominant medium to defy the stereotypical conventional ideas that associate disability with tragedy. One can observe a marked difference between the demeaning jokes made at the expense of disabled people (disabling humour) by mainstream non-disabled comedians and the disability humour used by disabled comedians from their everyday lived experiences. This article attempts to show how disability humour becomes a powerful medium of art in the public sphere to subvert the depiction of disability as a sentimental or tragic narrative. By employing the theoretical framework of humour theory, the article analyses the various Indian stand-up comedies performed by disabled comedians. It then demonstrates how they use the medium of humour as a form of activism to re-establish their identity of disability. Through the study of selected Indian Stand-up comedy videos, this article argues that disability humour acts as a tool of sub-cultural resistance to question and challenge the ableist normative attitudes, behaviours, misconceptions and oppression of disabled people.