Ridicule and rapture: The discursive politics of humor in pandemic Norway

Abstract

This article examines how political humor on Norwegian Twitter (X) functioned as democratic boundary work, delineating symbolic divisions between citizens and political elites. Drawing on Chantal Mouffe’s theory of agonistic pluralism and employing a mixed-methods approach combining computational modeling with multimodal critical discourse analysis (MCDA), the study analyzes humorous tweets referencing Norwegian authorities. The findings reveal two distinct discourses of critical humor: agonistic humor, which ridicules elite incompetence and inconsistency while maintaining their legitimacy as democratic actors; and antagonistic humor, which portrays the political elite as corrupt, authoritarian and morally excluded from the demos. Within Norway’s high-trust context, agonistic humor reinforces norms and expectations of competence and transparency, while antagonistic humor exposes the volatility of legitimacy during crises. The study contributes to discourse studies by demonstrating how humor performs boundary work, and how multimodal critical discourse analysis can uncover the semiotic strategies through which citizens delineate and negotiate the boundaries of legitimate power relations.