Ioumal of Psychosomatic Research, Vol. 15, pp. 387 to 390. Pert~amon Press, 1971.
Printed in Northern Ireland
DO DOGS LAUGH?*
A CROSS-CULTURAL APPROACH TO BODY SYMBOLISM
MARY DOUGLAS
THE BODY, as a vehicle of communication, is misunderstood if it is treated as a signal
box, a static framework emitting and receiving strictly coded messages. The body
communicates information for and from the social system in which it is a part. It
should be seen as mediating the social situation in at least three ways. It is itself the
field in which a feedback interaction takes place. It is itself available to be given as
the proper tender for some of the exchanges which constitute the social situation.
And further it mediates the social structure by itself becoming its image. Some of
this I have discussed in an earlier contribution to this journal [l], and in Purity and
Danger [2]. To adapt the signal box metaphor to show the full involvement of the
body in communication we should have to imagine a signal box which folds down
and straightens up, shakes, dances, goes into a frenzy or stiffens to the tune of the
more precise messages its lights and signal arms are transmitting. This paper is
offered as a background to those others which treat of specialised signalling systems
such as the voice and the face. It is offered as a preface to Professor Jenner’s dis-
cussion of endogenous factors. I will suggest a parallel set of social factors exogenous
to the biological organism, feedback pathways which control the rhythm of social
interaction.
A young zoologist, who asked my advice about a study he was making of laughter
in human and non-human species, complained that sociologists had given him very
little help. Indeed it is very difficult for us to produce a theory or even a vague
hypothesis on the subject. My own idea on the body’s role in joke symbolism is not
easily adapted to an experimental approach to laughter [3]. We know that some
tribes are said to be dour and unlaughing. Others laugh easily. Pygmies lie on the
ground and kick their legs in the air, panting and shaking in paroxysms of laughter
[4]. Francis Huxley noted the same bodily abandonment to convulsions of gaiety in
Haiti [5]. But we have so far found nothing to say about these differences that
could help the zoologist. It is just as difficult for us to suppose that laughter in different
tribes means the same thing, as to be sure that animals are laughing when they grin
and splutter.
Bergson declared that laughter is the unique prerogative of humans [6]. However,
we have it from a biologist that dogs laugh as they play. Lorenz in Man Meets Dog [7]
describes the case: “* - - an invitation to play always follows; here the slightly opened
jaws which reveal the tongue, and the tilted angle of the mouth which stretches almost
from ear to ear give a still stronger impression of laughing. This ‘laughing’ is most
often seen in dogs playing with an adored master and which become so excited that
they soon start panting”. He suggests that the same facial expression marks the
beginning of erotic excitement.
Here is a description of the beloved master playing with his dog. Thomas Mann
describes ways of rousing and stimulating his dog. “Or we amuse ourselves, I by
tapping him on the nose, and he, by snapping at my hand as though it were a fly.
It makes us both laugh. Yes. Bashan has to laugh too; and as I laugh I marvel at
* From the Department of Antropology, University College, Gower Street, London WCl.
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