Dr I.B. Nieuwenhuis (Ivo)

Ivo Nieuwenhuis is Assistant Professor of Dutch literature at the Radboud University Department of Modern Languages and Cultures. His teaching includes, among other things: early-modern literary history, literary theory and art cricism. He did his PhD at the University of Amsterdam (2014). The topic was late eighteenth century Dutch satire.

Ivo's current research is mainly focused on the politics of humour. Questions that interest him are: Is all humour political, and what do we actually mean when we claim that humour is ‘political’? How could we distinguish between humour and politics as social spheres or ‘language games’, but at the same time take into account humour’s significant political implications in terms of gender, race, and class relations? Is humour necessarily subversive and oppositional, or can it also be conservative and disciplinary, and if so, under what historical and social conditions?

Ivo has published on these and related issues in journals such as HUMOR and Eighteenth-Century Studies. He also contributed to the recent volume Comedy and Critical Thought: Laughter as Resistance (published by Rowman & Littlefield, 2018).

Besides his academic work, Ivo also works as a comedy critic for the national Dutch newspaper Trouw.