Comedians Doing Bits: Reconsidering the Autotelic Quality of Play

• In Event: 545 - Section on Sociology of Culture Roundtable Session.
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 14. Theory II

Abstract

This article aims to develop the importance of the concept of play in understanding the ethnomethods used by actors to produce recognizable social orders in human interactions, and in particular to question the often de facto assumption in the play literature that play qua play is an autotelic undertaking. In other words, to trouble the requirement that play have no purpose but to fulfil itself. By requiring that play be autotelic, this tautological definition ultimately acts to conceal the myriad of practical functions of play, one of which is demonstrating group membership in social communities with fuzzy borders, which is the focus of this paper. The case study herein is the improvisational comedy community based at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York City. While approximately 500 performers are at any given time an official member of the theatre, several thousand more students and aspiring comedians are in social negotiations to belong to the larger community. The specific object of analysis is the “bit” - the semi-structured humorous play that comedians engage in informally. These bits are playful encounters in which participants “riff” with each other in the same manner they are instructed to “yes and” in their improvisational classes. While the official narrative of group membership is one of excelling in the officially sanctioned arenas of performance (classes, auditions, shows) will lead to group membership and affirmation, an integral but unofficial part of belonging is aptitude at the informal “bits.”

Author

• Nathan James Dern, Columbia University