#CovidEaster – Humour in the Digital Sharing of Easter Festive Material During the COVID-19 Pandemic
#CovidEaster – Humour in the Digital Sharing of Easter Festive Material During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Summary/Abstract: During the COVID-19 pandemic, social media usage increased due to limitations on physical gatherings. As a result, social media platforms also became important outlets for celebrating holidays. This study therefore analyses the role of humour in the digital sharing of Easter festive material during the COVID-19 pandemic in the context of digital folklore. The research was conducted on the social media platform Instagram using Easter-related hashtags (#covideaster) to collect a digital corpus consisting of various visual-verbal internet genres, mainly internet memes and their subgenres. The corpus was divided into six thematic-motif groups and analysed in relation to topical cycle jokes, newslore, political humour, and disaster humour. Two groups present typical Easter symbols incorporated into pandemic-related memes, reflecting a modified typical image of Easter before and after the pandemic. They deliver humorous messages through incongruity resolution using familiar Easter-related imagery and news-inspired pandemic verbal messages. The remaining four groups present Easter in atypical ways, incorporating elements from popular culture, politics, classic jokes, and a parody of Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper. It was concluded that the role of humour in the digital sharing of Easter festive material during the pandemic served various purposes. It provided a means of coping with the situation, acted as a communication tool for conveying important safety messages, and fostered a sense of community and connection among Instagram users.

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