The Comic Unmasking of Pretense

The Comic Unmasking of Pretense identifies comedy's distinctive capacity to expose the artificiality of social performance and the hypocrisies embedded in institutions and personal conduct. Nasreddin repeatedly encounters pompous scholars, corrupt judges, and self-important merchants whom he humbles through comedic exposure of their pretense. African comedy traditions similarly function as social mirrors, comically stripping away the respectability masks worn by political leaders, religious authorities, and wealthy elites. This concept recognizes that comedy achieves what other discourse cannot—audiences willingly laugh along as their own pretenses are revealed. The comic unmasking works through exaggeration and paradox rather than moral lecturing; it invites complicity rather than defensiveness. By making the gap between public pretense and private reality laugh-worthy, both traditions create social pressure toward authenticity and accountability without requiring formal institutions of justice.