Stand-up; or, Peculiar Dialogue
Piotr Zdziarstek
piotr.zdziarstek@phdstud.ug.edu.plDoctoral School of Humanities and Social Sciences of University of Gdańsk (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8625-8082
Abstract
The author analyzes stand-up as a dialogue between the comedian and audience, shaped by a paradoxical dynamic — from winning favour to provoking and creating distance. Drawing on Jan Mukařovský, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Erika Fischer-Lichte, the study highlights the tension between spontaneity and rhetorical preparation. The comedian engages in dialogue not only with the audience but also with the world and themselves, becoming a polyphonic medium where diverse voices, beliefs, and contexts intersect.
Keywords:
stand-up comedy, dialogicity, dialogue, monologue, performance, interactionReferences
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Authors
Piotr Zdziarstekpiotr.zdziarstek@phdstud.ug.edu.pl
Doctoral School of Humanities and Social Sciences of University of Gdańsk Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8625-8082
Piotr Zdziarstek - a doctoral student at the Doctoral School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Gdansk, Faculty of Philology, affiliated with the UG Institute for Cultural Research. His academic interests include comedy and popular culture, especially the art of stand-up, to which he devotes his doctoral dissertation. In addition to his academic activities, he performs as a stand-up (under the pseudonym Piotr Splin), and also works as a screenwriter and comedy writer.
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