Studies in American Humor

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Studies in American Humor publishes articles on topics, themes, practices, practitioners, and media across the wide spectrum of American humor, past and present, for an audience made up primarily of scholars and students in the humanities, especially literary and cultural studies. StAH values new transnational and interdisciplinary approaches as well as traditional critical and historical humanities scholarship.

Call for Papers Studies in American Humor Special Issue: "AI and Humor" - See Submissions tab for details.

Studies in American Humor, the journal of the American Humor Studies Association, invites submission of scholarly papers on the topic of artificial intelligence (AI) and humor for a special issue of the journal appearing in the fall of 2026, edited by Rob King (Columbia University). See the Submissions tab for additional information.

Published continuously since 1982, Studies in American Humor is the official journal of the American Humor Studies Association.

Editor
David Gillota, University of Wisconsin, Platteville, US

Contributing Editors
Joanne Gilbert, Alma College, US
Heidi Hanrahan, Shepherd University, US
Jonathan Rossing, Gonzaga University, US
Todd Thompson, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, US

Associate Editors
Sabrina Fuchs Abrams, SUNY Empire State College, US
Gretchen Martin, University of Virginia at Wise, US

Book Review Editor
Christopher Gilbert, Assumption University, US

Editorial Board
John Bird, Winthrop University. US
Gregg Camfield, University of California, Merced, US
James E. Caron, University of Hawai’i, US
Ben Click, St. Mary's College of Maryland, US
Joseph Csicsila, Eastern Michigan University, US
Amber Day, Bryant University, US
Darryl Dickson-Carr, Southern Methodist University, US
Jennifer Greenhill, University of Southern California, US
Alan Gribben, Auburn University, Montgomery, US
Maggie Hennefeld, University of Minnesota, US
Lawrence Howe, Roosevelt University, US
Lanita Jacobs, University of Southern California, US
Holger Kersten, Martin Luther Universität at Halle-Wittenberg, US
Karen Kilcup, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, US
Rob King, Columbia University, US
Rebecca Krefting, Skidmore College, US
Peter Kunze, University of Texas at Austin, US
Judith Yaross Lee, Ohio University, US
Bruce Michelson, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US
Linda A. Morris, University of California, Davis, US
Peter Murphy, Murray State University, US
Ed Piacentino, High Point University, US
Joseph Slade, Ohio University, US
David E. E. Sloane, University of New Haven, US
Tracy Wuster, University of Texas at Austin, US

Submissions of manuscripts of between 5000 and 8000 words are welcome on any topic, theme, practice, practitioner, and medium of American humor. The journal is particularly interested in receiving essays on what is laughable and culturally significant in the following topics:
* literary humor
* graphic humor (e.g., print comics, animated cartoons, editorial and gag cartoons, etc.)
* stand-up comedians (as humorists or satirists)
* sketch comedy
* tv comedians (e.g.,performers from Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca, and Flip Wilson through Lily Tomlin, the Smothers Brothers, and Dick Cavett to Bill Maher, Larry Wilmore, and Samantha Bee)
* tv and radio sitcoms
* humors of race, gender, ethnicity, religion, national origin (including humor in American languages other than English)
* film comedy
* Gilded Age humorists other than Mark Twain
* Civil War humor
* high-brow humorists (e.g., James Russell Lowell, Oliver Wendell Holmes)

To submit a manuscript to the editorial office, please visit http://www.editorialmanager.com/sah and create an author profile. The online system will guide you through the steps to upload your manuscript.

Authors are responsible for securing permissions if their accepted submissions contain copyrighted material beyond fair use. All contributors must be members in good standing of the American Humor Studies Association (AHSA) at the time of publication. Membership information is available via the AHSA website.

Call for Papers - Special Issue: AI and Humor

Studies in American Humor, the journal of the American Humor Studies Association, invites submission of scholarly papers on the topic of artificial intelligence (AI) and humor for a special issue of the journal appearing in the fall of 2026, edited by Rob King (Columbia University).

The last few years have witnessed what some have called a “Cambrian explosion” of Generative AI, encompassing such fields as text creation (e.g., ChatGPT), image generation (e.g., Midjourney), and even moving images (e.g., Sora), as well as democratizing access to coding languages and computational resources. This special issue of Studies in American Humor invites a variety of perspectives on these developments – both what they might imply for the study of humor, and what humor might imply for the uses of AI.

Possible topics include but are not limited to the following: AI and humor theory; the history of computational humor research; faux AI humor (e.g. Keaton Patti’s botscripts); the relation of AI humor to analyses of race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, and ability; posthuman laughter/comedy; funny bots and social media; issues and challenges in AI joke detection and generation; statistical vs. symbolic approaches to AI humor; cultural representations (e.g., Data in Star Trek TNG, TARS in Interstellar); ethical considerations in AI-generated humor (e.g., the potential for offensiveness); and case studies of AI humor applications.

Potential contributors should send résumés and abstracts (300 words) to , by January 1, 2025. The deadline for final submissions will be September 1, 2025, and the scheduled release date of the issue is fall 2026. Final manuscripts should be in the range of 5000 to 8000 words. Essays on technical issues (e.g., programming/coding) are welcome, but should be accessible to non-specialist readers. Any questions can be forwarded to the editorial team at the above email address or to guest editor Rob King at .

Institutional Print & Online - $240.00

Institutional Print or Online - $172.00

Institutional Single Issue - $93.00

Individual Print & Online - $85.00

Individual Print or Online - $61.00

Individual Single Issue - $37.00

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