Sex, death, deformity and disease, eschatology, politics in all its manifestations: corruption, factionalism discrimination; religion, rituals and prejudices; money and political greed, violence, abuse, among many other aspects, are part of everyday life and also of  taboo, humour and comedy.

The third edition of the Taboo-TaCo 2016 series of conferences, “Taboo and humour. Language, Culture, Society and the Media”, will address the complexity of taboo in different social and cultural settings, from the point of view of its production, performance and reception. An interdisciplinary conference organized by the Department of Translation and Language Sciences at Pompeu Fabra University that will take place on 20 and 21 September, from 9.15 am to 6.15 pm, on the Poblenou campus.  Patrick Zabalbeascoa, Guillermo Parra, Victòria Alsina, Anna Espunya, Dídac Pujol and Katarzyna Gorska are members of the Organizing Committee, together with professors from the University of Vic and the Hellenic Open University.

Given that in recent years taboo, humour and comedy have come to be especially relevant and present in many social settings, this conference aims to explore the changing boundaries of the acceptability of humour, taboo and comedy in their possible forms. Researching how these cultural manifestations occur and how they are perceived in today’s multicultural society, in real life, in communities and in virtual contexts.

The possible areas of study involved in this field of knowledge and thinking are linked with the interaction and influence of political viewpoints on comedy, political satire, gender identity, ethnic humour and stereotypes, comedy that deals with different kinds of non-standard behaviour, political correctness and the discourse that surrounds it, and the debate between real and perceived attack through comedy.

An academic programme with a wide and varied participation

The Taboo-TaCo 2016 programme includes two plenary sessions, with two lecturers as keynote speakers who have been invited due to their acknowledged expertise, together with 70 presentations making up the conference sessions.

First, on 20 September Giselinde Kuipers, professor of cultural sociology (University of Amsterdam) and author of the work Good Humor, Bad Taste: A Sociology of the Joke (2006, 2015), will give the talk “That’s not funny! Humor, taboo and the regulation of discourse”.

On 21 September, the second plenary session will be given by Delia Chiaro (University of Bologna) by the title of: “The British and their love-hate relationship with the cheap innuendo”.  Professor Chiaro is the author of several works, the most recent being: The Language of Jokes in the Digital Age (2016).

The conference website includes the participants and abstracts of the communications presented by researchers at the University:

• Arias-Badia, Blanca: Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, “I’m a very neat monster!: Language exploitation as a humoristic device in crime TV shows”
• Darriba Zaragoza, Marc: Pompeu Fabra University, “Like if I was Romanian!”. Parodying/Producing Racism in Public TV: the case of Xavier García Albiol in Polònia (TV3)
• Garin, Manuel: Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, “The Last Laugh: Understanding Suicide Gags in Film Comedy”.
• Parra, Guillermo: Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, “Drugs and taboo in the translation of audiovisual dialogue”.
• Roig, Rosa: Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, “Translating Chavs into Catalan: The Dubbing of Little Britain by the Catalan Public Broadcaster”.
• Zabalbeascoa, Patrick: Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, “Terrorists in Madrid change guns and bombs for Punch and Judy”.

Follow-up and further information on social networks:
 

@TACOConference