The research is devoted to the consideration of mockery as a contemporary communicative phenomenon. The article describes trends of the modification in the genre mass media field, a characterization of some sociocultural background and preconditions of mockery’s origin is discussed, two variants of mockery – intellectual and marginal – are distinguished. Mockery as a sociocultural phenomenon appears as a result of carnivalization, critical evaluation and parody, which are based on the means of the comic – irony, satire, sarcasm.