The article “Laughing Machines”, by Jacob Smith (published in 2004), talks primarily about the use of laugh tracks in comical television. The main point of the article is the claim that television audiences find the use of laugh tracks in the shows they watch to be “unsettling”, but Smith’s view feels very outdated and causes many questions to arise. Why are laugh tracks are continually used in modern day television if they truly do “unsettle” the audience? Do they even unsettle the audience at all? Why do we laugh tracks at all in television, and what purpose do they serve? Answers these questions go unaddressed by the author and thus need to be explored more readily. While Smith’s assertion that people do not enjoy laugh tracks seems fitting, I propose that this is not because viewers find it unsettling, but rather that viewers associate laugh tracks with…show more content… Live entertainment was no longer the only option. This had the negative effect of eliminating individuals’ ability to gauge their reactions against other members of an audience. This brings us back to the laugh track. Not only do laugh tracks tell the audience the location of, as well as how to react to, certain jokes, but the track also helps to create “a communal, theatrical experience for that domestic audience … people laugh more, and find things funnier if they hear other people laughing too (Mills 104).” A third use of the laugh track is that it allows comedy to “feel like a ‘safe’ space where it is okay to laugh at people’s misfortunes or transgressions (Bore 24). A possible source of contention regarding laugh tracks is that they, in effect, trick the audience into buying into a “hilarious” situation more than they might do so otherwise. If laughter is explicitly pointing out what is supposed to be funny, it closes down the realm of available
