Hypnotism
Recently, for the first time in my life, I witnessed a live hypnosis show. In the act, a trained professional convinced first-year Furman students they were driving cars, suntanning on the beach, giving birth, facing an alien evasion, and experiencing all kinds of other crazy tribulations in a false reality. It was by far one of the best works of comedy I've ever seen. Often, I found myself laughing so hard I was crying. It is easy to establish how funny the skit was (the audience found it as enjoyably comical as I did), but what exactly made this piece so humorous? Where the actions of my fellow classmates amusing because their behaviors were degrading and I felt superior? Was disbanding norms by combining two ideas, not typically used in relation to one another, why the audience found themselves laughing? Was watching the students speak openly about the sometimes inappropriate subject matter a way for the audience to let loose? It is my beli...