Encountering (im)probable wit: Religious puns in an Indonesian post-conflict setting
18.09.2025Slama, M. (2025) Encountering (im)probable wit: Religious puns in an Indonesian post-conflict setting. The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 00, 1–16. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/taja.70037
Abstract:
This paper analyses religion-related humour in the post-conflict setting of the Moluccas, Indonesia, which were haunted by interreligious violence in the late 1990s and early 2000s. It is concerned with religious puns told among Hadhramis, Indonesians of Arab descent, whose ancestors migrated in pre-colonial and colonial times from the Hadhramaut to the Indonesian archipelago where they occupy influential positions in the Islamic landscape. Building on anthropological approaches to humour that stress ambiguity and power asymmetries, the paper argues that the puns play with Islam as a humorous topic, transforming the initial improbability of religious humour in post-conflict Ambon into a legitimate expression of wit. This points to the subject position of Hadhramis as tellers of these jokes, showing how the puns inform the reassertion of Islamic authority and assist in coping with the post-conflict situation.