Laughing and Learning

The end of this semester is a little bit more bittersweet than others.  The overwhelming sense of a relief a teacher feels when class is over is just indescribable. Don’t get me wrong. I love teaching, but there’s a point where I feel I have nothing left to give.  This semester is different though because it was the first semester I taught my comedy- and humor-themed research composition class at Wright State. I prepared for this class for months and this fall, my experiment began.
I asked my students to write jokes, research papers on comedians or comedic techniques and journals on academic