The “Humoralist” as Journalistic Jammer Zondag met Lubach and the discursive construction of investigative comedy

This study contributes to ongoing discussions on the societal role of satire as a platform for public debate. To this end, we analysed the metajournalistic discourse surrounding the Dutch television news satire show Zondag met Lubach to assess how it has been received and discussed in the Dutch media landscape. Through an analysis of 64 media appearances (2014–2020) with the host and staff members of the show, we zoom in on how discursive exchanges between Zondag met Lubach and media professionals reflect and shape understandings of the journalistic. Thereby, we distinguish three phases of identity construction for the show. Our findings reveal how Zondag met Lubach entered the Dutch media landscape as a comedic non-journalistic outsider, but has gradually become legitimated as a quasi-insider to the journalistic field, embodying the nuanced role of investigative comedy. We conclude by discussing how the concept of investigative comedy elicits reflection on the epistemic authority of novel incantations of journalistic storytelling, and how it contributes to the expansion of conventional assumptions among satirists and media professionals about what journalism can or should be.