My paradigm shift paper focuses on the shift that has occurred in stand-up comedy over the past few decades. It analyzes specials by Bill Cosby, Eddie Murphy, and Louis CK. In the paper, I analyze the specials in three categories: Content, Delivery, and Audience Reaction. Later, the paper delves into the scientific remedies laughter provides, and explains why comedy is incredibly important in today’s society.

However, for my TED Talk, I plan on focusing more on the present day and why comedy is an integral part of society’s healing process. Therefore, I will be focusing primarily on the work of Louis CK and what his comedy shows us about society and how it is working to make people feel better about the world as a whole. To highlight CK’s work, I will be adding more excerpts of his special than are present in my paper, either through my own speech or through the use of multimedia. I will then quickly explain how these jokes remedy society’s woes, and explain why comedy is so important.

Because of this focus on Louis CK, I will only briefly mention the work of Bill Cosby and Eddie Murphy. I will use them as examples of how comedy shifted from just telling jokes to telling jokes that made people feel better and end some of the awful aspects of society.

Also, I will be focusing mainly on the content of the jokes, slightly on the audience reaction, and very little on the delivery. By doing this, it will eliminate the name from the jokes, and help show how all comedians in this day in age, not just Louis CK, use their jokes to make people feel better.

I think these additions, omissions, and highlights will help me transform my paradigm shift paper, which is focused on the comedy itself, into a TED Talk that shows the importance of comedy in today’s world.