Humor, Context, Divided Cognition

Humor, Context, and Divided Cognition
Author(s): Lawrence Lengbeyer

Source: Social Theory and Practice , July 2005, Vol. 31, No. 3 (July 2005), pp. 309-336
Published by: Florida State University Department of Philosophy
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23558520
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Humor, Context, and Divided Cognition
Need one be sexist to laugh at a sexist joke? Racist to laugh at a racist

joke? Anti-Semitic to laugh at an anti-Semitic joke? One influential con
strual of joke-telling and joke-receiving behavior suggests an affirmative
answer to such questions. This position, advanced by Ronald de Sousa,1
relies upon what we may call the "Endorsement Thesis," to the effect
that experiencing amusement at such humor entails that one endorses the
sexist, racist, or anti-Semitic premises upon which the logic of the joke
depends. I will argue, however, for a negative answer to the question fac
ing us, for two reasons. First, the Endorsement Thesis is false. The laugh
ter that a joke elicits from us is a response not only to the joke's con
tent—its semantics, if you will—but also to the pragmatics of the joke
telling, that is, what is conveyed to the audience by virtue of the contexts
in which the particular telling takes place. Some of these broader prag
matic features can provoke amusement in those who do not share a
joke's underlying sexist premises. (I will generally be focusing upon sex
ism, taking it to be representative of the larger set.) This provides us with
clear counterexamples to the Endorsement Thesis. Second, even if the
Endorsement Thesis is true, it does not, on its most reasonable interpreta
tion, entail that one must be sexist in order to enjoy a sexist joke. People
can momentarily endorse sexist ideas without being properly described
as sexists. The divided, compartmentalized nature of cognition permits
us to operate temporarily with outlooks that do not reflect or represent
the ones that most accurately characterize us.
1. The Anatomy of a Sexist Joke
In his book The Rationality of Emotion, de Sousa highlights a particular

kind of emotional reaction to jokes, "phthonic laughter," that includes
what is in his view a morally dubious element of malice directed toward
the target, or butt, of the joke. A joke can contain wit as well as phthonos
'Ronald de Sousa, The Rationality of Emotion (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1987),
pp. 289-95.
) Copyright 2005 by Social Theory and Practice, Vol. 31, No. 3 (July 2005)
309

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310 Lawrence Lengbeyer
(de Sousa writes as if these features are inherent c

joke), but to the extent that we derive amusement fr
nastiness, we may deserve moral condemnation, beca
by the joke entails, according to de Sousa, that we su
hensible attitudes that are presupposed by comprehen
We are certainly in de Sousa's debt for his provocativ
uncharted waters2—but is he right?
To begin our assessment of de Sousa's account, let's
lowing illustrative joke that he presents:
M. visits the hockey team. When she emerges she complains

raped. Wishful thinking.3
De Sousa points out that "the joke seems to imply cer

as, we might say, that a woman might want to be gan
(as long as the joke-hearer has in mind a woman w
masochistic) that gang rape might be enjoyable. (De S
as the proposition "that rape is just a variant for
course."5) According to de Sousa, these are "sexist ass
laugh at the joke marks you as sexist." He argues as f
the Endorsement Thesis:
[MJerely to know... [the sexist presuppositions of the joke] doesn 't make the joke funny...
... [T]o find the joke funny, the listener must actually share those sexist attitudes. In
contrast to the element of wit, the phthonic element in a joke requires endorsement ... It
does not allow of hypothetical laughter. The phthonic makes us laugh only insofar as the
assumptions on which it is based are attitudes actually shared. [Hence "[i]t is not a con
vincing defense to say, 'I was merely going along with the assumptions required to get
the point of the joke'."] ...
Although we cannot come to find something funny by merely imagining that we
share its phthonic assumptions, we intuitively know that sharing these assumptions is
what would enable us to find it funny ... [W]ithout the possibility of this sort of second
order knowledge ... there could be no criticism of other people's laughter.6
2Some other researchers have since concurred with de Sousa's position: e.g., Merrie
Bergmann, "How Many Feminists Does It Take to Make a Joke? Sexist Humor and
What's Wrong with It," Hypatia 1 (1986): 63-82. See also Jennifer Hay, "The Pragmatics
of Humor Support," Humor 14 (2001): 55-82, p. 76: "sometimes the 'humor' may depend
on sharing a certain attitude. Especially in examples such as ethnic or sexist humor, if the
hearer doesn't share a certain belief..., the joke may fall completely flat"; and p. 72: "Un
qualified support of humor [which includes laughter, contributing more humor, and play
ing along] implicates agreement with the message, including any attitudes, presupposi
tions or implicatures contained in the humor."
3De Sousa, The Rationality of Emotion, p. 290.
4Ibid.
5Ibid.
6Ibid., pp. 290-91.

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Humor, Context, and Divided Cognition 311
It is far from clear how to analyze what is going on in the rape joke,
or why it is found to be funny—a truth about jokes that we will come to
see as applying much more widely. But de Sousa, it must be said, offers
a distinctly unusual, and unpersuasive, reading of the situation. He
claims that the joke "seems to imply ... the belief that all women secretly
want to be raped."7 Moreover, relying upon an informant who thought it
crucial to the joke to realize that the butt of the joke, M., was promiscu
ous (the original version of the joke referred explicitly by name to the
jet-setter Margaret Trudeau),8 de Sousa states that M.'s promiscuity "is
indeed a hypothetical assumption of the joke," and that on this under
standing, the joke presupposes two further "sexist assumptions" in addi
tion to the one I have mentioned: "that women's sexual desires are indis
criminate; and that there is something intrinsically objectionable or evil
about a woman who wants or gets a lot of sex"9 (the latter being part of
"the sexist double standard"10).
But none of this analysis is very convincing.11 For one thing, there is
no need for the hearer12 to generalize to all or even most women, regard
ing either their secret wishes or the indiscriminateness of their sexual
desires—particularly where the joke is heard as applying specifically to
one individual. Second, if M. is presumed or known to be promiscuous,
and (perhaps) thereby undiscriminating, then yes, the very fact of the
joke being told at her expense (not the content of the joke itself) does
imply that there is something in her character or conduct that deserves to
be poked fun at. But the poking involved in joking can be fond teasing,
or admiring ribbing, or gentle mocking, rather than the righteous scorn or
malicious contempt that de Sousa supposes.13 And it is very difficult to
7Ibid„ p. 290.
8Trudeau, the former wife of a 1970s-era Prime Minister of Canada, had been reputed
to have (following her separation from her much older husband) amorous involvements
with various musicians, actors, politicians, and professional athletes.
10Ibid,p. 291.
"The following critique of de Sousa's analysis departs substantially from the com
mentaries found in the existing literature, such as the perceptive discussions in Laurence
Goldstein, "Humor and Harm," Sorites 3 (1995): 27-42, pp. 29-30, and Robert C. Rob
erts, "Humor and the Virtues," Inquiry 31 (1988): 127-49, pp. 135-38. See also David
Benatar, "Prejudice in Jest: When Racial and Gender Humor Harms," reprinted in David
Benatar (ed.), Ethics for Everyday (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2002), pp. 40-51, at pp. 45
47.
12Though I will focus my remarks upon joke-hearers, some of what I say applies also
to joke-readers, and even to mere joke-thinkers who are creating jokes or internally re
playing those that are stored in memory.
13Roberts offers some helpful elaborations of this point ("Humor and the Virtues,"
pp. 139-40, 145), to be contrasted with the unrelievedly darker view of J. Harvey in
"Humor as Social Act: Ethical Issues," Journal of Value Inquiry 29 ( 1995): 19-30.

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assess accurately the feelings and motivations of t

others, particularly in view of the variety of soci
such poking occurs, and also the diverse relation
and pokees. (Even a single audience might co
laughters manifest diverse attitudes toward the bu
group to which the butt belongs.) Ought we presum
nature of the attitudes maintained by various popu
promiscuity in young women?
Furthermore, the notion that M.'s promiscuity i
the joke is itself questionable. My own male student
despite the lack of any obvious individual target t
taken to refer, and their explanation of their amuse
of promiscuity, nor did they ratify that proposal w
them. Rather, what they thought they found funn
ently unattractive young woman sufficiently delu
about what others think of her to believe that ma
desire to have sex with her—and also, we might add
to think that other, third parties share this belief a
upon hearing her accusation they could be expecte
ble. (The joke's narrator, in saying "Wishful thinkin
no sexual activity actually transpired.14) Moreover
dents also showed some amusement at the joke
characters were reversed, seemingly contrary to de
joke would thereby lose its point15—suggesting th
ences for the original version, might be finding a
human foibles that are inflected only marginally, i
ences.16 Indeed, it would not be surprising at al
14These student joke-hearers evidently reasoned backward

sex occurred, despite M.'s wishes for it; therefore (given m
seems most likely that M. must be very sexually unattractive;
M. to think her allegation plausible (or to expect others to beli
may have construed the narrator's "Wishful thinking" as deris
not just false, but preposterous to suggest that sex occurred—th
then being (in their minds) that M. must be very sexually unat
laughable for her to deem her allegation to be believable.
Bergmann ("How Many Feminists Does ft Take to Make a
the kind of amusement involved here: "We do laugh at stupidit
the face of the obvious, and the woman who supposes herse
when in fact she has the corresponding defects is a case in
Taking Laughter Seriously (Albany: State University of New
16The predicament of a female protagonist might be conceiv
manding standards of physical beauty that our culture ge
whereas a male protagonist might prompt identification in ma
laughter at themselves as men who can only dream of ob

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humor in the sex-reversed version of the joke, and from much the same
"Yeah, you wish!" thinking that seems to drive the response of at least
some men to both versions. None of this is to insist that no hearers of the
rape joke have a promiscuous woman (or man) in mind—only that we
are likely to be led astray if we are not open to the diversity of construals
that a joke can be given.17
The plausibility of amused responses to the sex-reversed joke hints,18
moreover, that hearers of this kind of joke, whether male or female, do
not construe "gang-raped," when it appears here (and probably in other
jokes, too), as having the same ordinary literal meaning that the term is
given by those who police humor for offensiveness or by those who are
engaging in serious discussions of, say, public affairs. In a context of
levity—which fairly describes the way that many joke-telling situations
are perceived by their participants—some hearers appear to take "gang
rape" to signify "gang bang" and to be synonymous, or nearly so, with
"sex [intercourse] with multiple partners." Hence none of the "standard"
(i.e., serious-discourse) implications of the term "gang rape" need be pre
sent, let alone any of the deeply disturbing imagery that accompanies our
"deep" understanding of the term. In effect, joke-tellers and joke-hearers
are utilizing a very different sense of "gang rape" from the one that de
Sousa is bringing to his reading of the joke. Now, this may itself be ob
jectionable—for instance, it might be thought to have the likely conse
quence, assuming that there is some bleeding-through of the joke-sense
into serious-discourse contexts, of eroding the gravity with which the
topic of rape, and specific allegations of it, are treated. And college-age
men do understand the serious senses of "rape" and "gang rape" (if not
with as much detail as might be wished), so they cannot be excused as
we would excuse an eight-year-old who lacks that understanding and
athletic young women.

nA sensitive analysis of the inferences that may be drawn from the possibility of
substituting alternatives for the butt of a joke can be found in Goldstein, "Humor and
Harm," pp. 30-32.
18The reason for being so qualified in my claims in this section is not only the obvi
ous problem with getting into the minds of joke-hearers. Another problem with drawing
inferences from a small sample of audience responses to a given joke (and maybe even
from a large one) is that it is difficult to disentangle the effects of the social context upon
the responses. If the nature of the humor found in a joke can vary by the context of its
reception, as I maintain (see the next section), then we must be hesitant in drawing any
general conclusions about a joke from the response of a particular audience to a particular
joke-teller. To what extent, for instance, was the amusement elicited by my telling of the
sex-reversed rape joke to students at the United States Naval Academy a product of: My
evident status as a professor? The setting (a gym weight room, where my request to them
to listen to a joke must have seemed unexpected and odd)? The lack of any pre
established rapport with my audience? The telling of the joke to a group, rather than an
individual? My unprofessional delivery of the joke? And so on.

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ignorantly takes "rape" to mean "sex" (a concept that

only rudimentarily). But such a charge is entirely dist
not entail, the charge by de Sousa that those indiv
such a joke need to have endorsed sexist assumptions
rape. This he seems not to have established.
It might seem that we are going too easy on joke-ap
ascribing to them linguistic understandings that are a
dard meanings that words are given. The fact of the m
reflection makes clear, that the contexts of joke r
modes of construal or interpretation quite different f
we employ in other domains of language use.
On the reading that I have given of how the jok
seem possible that those who enjoy the joke hold unf
toward M., the butt of the joke, and maybe also towar
men) who can be likened to M. The unfavorablene
rather than vicious or condemnatory, but it would see
ridiculing is going on. If so, then we might be inclined
with the joke-hearers (and joke-teller)—not on acc
tudes, for these need not be present, but on account
laughing at the joke, the hearers may be displaying a
for another human being, or for an unattractive, or ev
attractive, young woman (or man) situated in a cul
sizes sexual allure. For some of the hearers, but only
ness will temper our judgment of them for their cal
misguided, longing M. Still, a laughing response b
degree of humanity, something for which people can b
Or can they? Is even this criticism unfair? Afte
minds of many hearers (such as my students), only a
or at least a generic one, rather than a specific flesh-a
who has a rightful claim upon our human sympathie
to spurn opportunities for laughter, and the fellowsh
that such laughter brings,19 simply in order to displa
an abstract character in a joke! On the other hand, if
jokes do engender habits of response that then exten
beings, then we do have cause for moral concern. We
an open question for the social scientists to answer
"M." (or a less coyly presented proper name) were ind
our audience to refer to Margaret Trudeau, or perhaps
individual known personally to them. Even in this ins
clear that enjoying a joke at M.'s expense would be
l9For an impressively thorough survey of the benefits of laugh

ing Laughter Seriously, pp. 85-129.

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sessment depends upon further premises, such as that the joke-hearers do

not distinguish M.-in-the-joke from the real person M., thereby allowing
their unfavorable attitudes to translate over from the former to the latter.
This, again, is an empirical question that we cannot resolve here, but
there seems to be good reason to think that we often, if not always, do
not merge the joke-world and the real-world in this manner. For consider
the jokes that we tell, and laugh at, that are directed at public figures.
These seem not to infect our attitudes toward the persons when we are
thinking about them in non-joking contexts. Sometimes, this is because
the joke character is a playfully manipulated stereotype or caricature that
we know to be an inaccurate representation,20 or because the joke de
scribes situations or events that we know not to be true to life. But this is
not always so. (Self-deprecating humor may provide another supporting
data point.)21
And matters are more complicated still. We granted provisionally at
the outset that the joke we are considering does imply that a young
woman might want to be gang-raped, and hence that gang rape might be
enjoyable. We now have still another reason for challenging this claim as
neglectful of the rich complexity of human psychology. For it is not un
common, however much we might decry it and fault our culture for it,
for women to maintain fantasies of being raped (or gang-raped). Obvi
ously, these fantasies generally partake of some kind of "shallow" con
strual of rape comparable to that which above was said to be used by
those who tell and enjoy the joke in question. Indeed, men may also in
dulge in rape fantasies, whether figuring as the perpetrators or victims,
and these fantasies, too, likely partake of a "shallow," benign conception
of rape. The existence of these various fantasies lends added plausibility
to the notion that the term "rape" (or even "gang rape") might, when ap
pearing within certain jokes, be given a construal that lacks many or all
of the features that make actual rape so appalling. And given that such
fantasies are well known,22 it seems quite possible that our joke might be
20See, e.g., Salvatore Attardo et al., "Debate: Humor and Political Correctness," Hu
mor 10 (1997): 453-513, pp. 485-86 (example offered by John Morreall).
21Berys Gaut, in "Just Joking: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Humor," Philosophy and
Literature 22 (1998): 51-68, pp. 56-58, usefully points out how jokes that appear to re
veal no attitudes toward real objects may be seen in fact to do so when subjected to more
subtle interpretation, but he pushes this position too far in writing that "those jokes ...
aimed at named, actual individuals ... no doubt... [reveal] attitudes towards actual indi
viduals" (p. 58).
22Even young, sexually inexperienced men might know enough about the nature of
women's sexual fantasies to enjoy the joke on this level. Of course, they are likely to
have obtained their awareness of such fantasies not by listening to women, but via visual
and verbal media depictions of women experiencing rape as pleasurable—depictions that
are not trustworthy as veridical representations of reality, certainly, but that are them

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understood by hearers as implying not that a youn

to be gang-raped, but only that she might wish it—
it happening to her. And, in turn, this implies only
being gang-raped might be enjoyable. So a more se
into question even the most basic sexist presupposit
joke to involve.
We see, then, that our "criticism of other people'
as de Sousa rightly asserts, dependent upon wha
sumptions presupposed and revealed by that lau
that, given the evident subtleties and uncertaintie
such determinations, our criticisms are fraught wit
De Sousa employs the terminology of "knowled
what is in the critic's mind23; but perhaps we wou
here upon terms like "judgment," or even "conje
knowledge just how difficult it is to ascertain why
ticular joke, and therefore just how easy it is to st
and unfairness when issuing criticisms of this kind
stronger reason for humility and tentativeness wh
the amusement they arouse. Because allegations of
etc.) are so charged in our culture, because offered
charges tend to elicit only further corrective effo
condemnations, because many well-meaning pe
think the worst of themselves regarding their own
and because humor is so poorly understood, it is u
that criticisms of laughter as betraying sexism are
to provoke in their targets silent resentment or sel
than the rigorous, earnest defenses that might
enlightened, and just appraisals.
2. The Context Makes the Joke
We have found it to be anything but straightforward to discern just what

attitudes are presupposed by an amused response to a particular joke.
This makes evaluation of the Endorsement Thesis more challenging, be
cause in any given case it is not clear just what its object is—what are the
attitudes that supposedly must be endorsed by joke-hearers before they
can find a joke funny. In the present section, we will find that a more
general or abstract consideration of joke-appreciation provides further
grounds for doubting the truth of the Endorsement Thesis.
selves a likely source of many of the actual fantasies in women, and that therefore turn
out to be, indirectly, good evidence for such fantasies.

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The essential insight behind this critique is Wittgensteinian or Tver

skian in spirit: there are more, and more diverse, contexts of joke-telling
and joke-receiving than we generally recognize and take account of in
our theorizing about humor. We rely upon an artificially limited "diet" of
examples,24 upon stereotypical situations that readily come to mind and
are thus more "available" to recollection than others that are no less
real,25 and so we construct descriptive, explanatory, evaluative, and pre
scriptive accounts that do not do justice to the phenomena that we are
considering.
In our case, it is the diversity of joke-appreciating situations that must
be recognized before we can render an accurate and fair appraisal of os
tensibly sexist (or otherwise denigrating) humor. Reflecting upon the
non-stereotypic situations reveals, we will see, that humor can sometimes
be found in sexist jokes by those who are not endorsing sexist premises.
In fact, in one kind of overlooked context, a certain brand of humor can
be found in the joke only by those who take themselves, as well as the
joke-teller and the other joke-hearers, to be clearly now-sexist and to
know this about one another.
One might find a sexist joke funny, for instance, largely because of its
outrageousness, its flouting of the norms of propriety (or "political cor
rectness") of which both listener and teller are mutually aware. There are
at least two distinct possible paths here to amusement. In one—and this
might explain some of the laughter elicited in students who hear the rape
joke from a teacher—the amusement derives from titillation at the inap
propriateness or outrageousness of the joking, similar to how in some
circumstances laughter is elicited by unexpected use of naughty lan
guage. For this reaction to be evoked in the circumstances, the joke need
not be thoroughly deciphered, its point grasped; simply catching the
tenor of its signification might be sufficient. In the second path, by con
trast, it is indeed essential that the audience construe the joke to be sexist.
But here the distinctive amusement is not provoked by the logic of the
joke itself, but by the suddenly dawning fact that a sexist joke has been
told (in these circumstances, by this person) and listened to heedfully,
24Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, 3rd ed., trans. G.E.M. Ans

combe (New York: Macmillan, 1958), para. 593; for further illustrations, see also, e.g.,
paras. 24, 33, 66-67, 164, and pp. 187-88, 224. For discussion of this aspect of Wittgen
stein's thought, see, e.g., Lawrence A. Beyer, '"Don't Think, But Look!': Wittgenstein
(& James) on Method," in Paul Weingartner, Gerhard Schurz, and Georg Dom (eds.),
The Role of Pragmatics in Contemporary Philosophy, vol. 1 (Kirchberg am Wechsel: The
Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society, 1997), pp. 53-59.
25Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, "Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and
Biases," in Daniel Kahneman, Paul Slovic, and Amos Tversky (eds.), Judgment under
Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), pp.
3-20, at pp. 11-14.

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maybe eagerly (by this particular person or person

explain some of the laughter of students hearin
teacher. But it has application in other sorts of cir
For instance, the very absurdity of one dependabl
other dependable non-sexist, in this situation, a jo
ist (on its face, at least), both of them being asked
ment the requisite sexist assumptions that they kn
might strike them as amusing, even hilarious.26 (A
one patently self-identified Jew telling another a jo
putative "fact" that Jews traditionally have killed
their blood.27)
De Sousa does have an inkling of such non-standard joking contexts.
He offers what he calls the "Python principle": "It can be funny to sup
pose that something that is not at all funny might be funny, but only if
you actually think it isn't actually funny."28 But whether the principle
holds or not, it does not, on its face, encompass the kinds of joking situa
tions just described. And, supposing that it can be applied to sexist jokes
in order to account for another, different sort of amusement that these
can provoke, it then would allow us to answer our original question—
Need one be sexist to laugh at a sexist joke?—in the negative, contrary to
de Sousa's position. For even if de Sousa is right that we cannot find
such a joke funny in itself if we do not endorse sexist views, the Python
principle would indicate that we can still laugh at the joke. This distinc
tion, which de Sousa would presumably accept, makes it unfortunate that
he chose to write that "to laugh at the [rape] joke marks you as sexist"
(emphasis altered), because that is not so.
How can we make sense of this distinction, between finding a joke
26Claudia Mills seems to hold that the "recognition that the [sexist] jokes are morally
suspect," which is, concededly, crucial for the amused reactions described in the text,
somehow entails the actual sharing of whatever sexist assumptions are exploited by the
jokes. Claudia Mills, "Racist and Sexist Jokes: How Bad Are They (Really)?" Report
from the Center for Philosophy and Public Policy 7 (1987): 9-12, pp. 10-11. But this
surely does not follow. In order to laugh, it is sufficient to know that others find the jokes
morally outrageous (or, analogously, that others deem certain words to be indecent)
without oneself agreeing with these evaluations. In addition, one may indeed view the
jokes as potentially morally dubious—when uttered in certain contexts, for example—but
without viewing them as inherently, invariably so. And, of course, if one does regard the
jokes as unacceptably offensive in themselves, yet finds these particular uses of them to
be funny, one obviously rejects the sexist assumptions underlying them.
27Don L.F. Nilsen has proposed that, distinct from jokes, "[t]here are joke parodies,
which have the form of jokes, but don't function as jokes, and work not as jokes, but as
parodies" (Attardo et al., "Debate: Humor and Political Correctness," p. 466). Might the
last two examples I have offered in the text fit that description—or at least a description
that would allow "joke parody" to be a subcategory of "joke"?
28De Sousa, The Rationality of Emotion, p. 291 (emphasis deleted).

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
funny in itself and finding it funny all things considered? It's tempting to
dismiss the distinction as a theoretician's misguided hypostasization of a
"joke-in-itself' that exists outside all context—something that is never
found in nature. Yet we do find ourselves drawing some such distinction
in everyday joking practice, as when we chokingly declare, about a joke
that has us in stitches, "That joke is so pathetic" or "I can't believe how
stupid that is!" So the distinction is apparently not spurious.
A helpful way to begin explicating it is with the linguists' and phi
losophers' distinction between semantics and pragmatics. This has been
characterized as, "roughly, the distinction between the significance con
ventionally ... attached to words ... and the further significance that can
be worked out ... using contextual information."29 That is, semantics
concerns itself with what is said by a sentence that is uttered, what mean
ing is conveyed by its strictly linguistic features (words arranged in
grammatical patterns), what "information" is "encoded" within the sen
tence.30 Pragmatics, by contrast, is concerned with what is expressed, all
things considered, the ultimate meaning that is conveyed by an utterance
of a given sentence in a particular context—how the standard, packaged
semantic meaning gets transformed (at times, overruled) in the process of
communication in a real, specific set of circumstances.
Now, joke-appreciation, it seems clear, requires perceptiveness re
garding the pragmatic, and not merely semantic, features of a joke that
has been told. For the typical joke, there is a great deal that is left unsaid,
left to be supplied by the hearer. Some of this is specific to the content of
the particular joke; some may involve conventions of the genre of which
the joke is a part, or conventions of local joking practice more generally;
some may concern the particular relationship between joke-teller and
joke-hearer, taking into account their present immediate circumstances as
well as the history of their interactions; and some may concern the nor
mal attitudes, practices, understandings, or ways of interacting found in
the (sub)culture of which the joke-teller and joke-hearer are members.
The telling of a joke is situated within multiple, concentrically radiating
29Martin Davies, quoted in Kent Bach, "The Semantics-Pragmatics Distinction: What

It Is and Why It Matters," in Ken Turner (ed.), The Semantics-Pragmatics Interface from
Different Points of View (Oxford: Elsevier, 1999), pp. 65-84, at p. 82.
30Bach, "The Semantics-Pragmatics Distinction," p. 74. Bach does note that there are
certain limited varieties of contextual information that are needed to "fix" or "fill in," as
it were, the variables left unspecified in indexical, demonstrative, and tense expressions
(e.g., "I," "that," "now"), and that therefore it may be reasonable to grant a role to some
narrow conception of context even in the realm of semantics. For a statement of the more
radical view that concludes from such observations that semantics simply cannot be dis
entangled from pragmatics, i.e., that "semantics is pragmatics," see François Recanati,
"Pragmatics," in Edward Craig (ed.), Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (London:
Routledge, 1998), pp. 620-33.

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contexts: textual, conversational, interactional, situat

tural. In fact, even when we take ourselves to be res
in-itself," we are probably (or perhaps inevitably) tak
information into account, rather than simply finding
tic content of the words alone.31
In humor, context is overriding. Joke-tellers, for e
get uproarious laughs for material that, when encoun
people in a different context, would not elicit any su
we have the common disclaimer for a joke gone bad
guess you had to be there." (In fact, it is this rampant
makes it so difficult to write persuasively about hum
trative jokes of whatever funniness readers are asked
reflect upon.) The difference might be simply that th
longer be heard with the anticipation of a funny comi
would no longer be coming from a particular jok
whether this is a professional comedian, a familiar
character, or merely funny old Uncle Felix. Likewise
that comic material that would, in other joking c
funny, provokes only stony silence (even when de
person, in the same way) in situations unsuited to hu
als, solemn prayer meetings, emerging crises or natu
ety-filled high-stakes exams.32 (Not that it is impossib
"step back" and reffame such situations in very diffe
reducing the anxiety enough, for the moment, th
through. And distinguish these cases from those whe
or even because of it, humor is welcomed and apprec
in the locker room before the all-important Big Game
Consider, in this regard, the context offered by the
the Prairie Home Companion radio show33 during wh
son Keillor, reads aloud messages from members of t
31Gaut ("Just Joking," p. 54) suggests that we imaginatively su

text" when talking about jokes in themselves. See also Michael P
Racist Humor," reprinted in Benatar (ed.), Ethics for Everyday, p
32Philips (ibid., pp. 16-17, 20) provides some further example
humor upon context. See also Attardo et al., "Debate: Humor an
pp. 461-70 (discussion of examples offered by Elliott Oring and
trast, there remain some scholars who insist that context has
here—Mahadev Apte, for example: "[Cjan't jokes be classified
just by their overt semantic content? Some jokes are so clearly rac
no context is necessary to realize whom they are aimed at and wh
... [Cjontents of jokes certainly reveal aggressive intent. Context m
but it certainly does not take it away" (ibid., pp. 494-95). Se
(comments of Charles Gruner, Larry Mintz), p. 508 (essay of Ela
33The particular show in question was taped on February 7,
Arkansas.

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family, friends, and others who are listening on the radio. Here's one:
"Remember, we'll buy you a dog as soon as your cats are dead." De
spite—or, probably, because of—the harshness of its content and its bru
tal lack of tact or euphemism, this message received much laughter from
the studio audience. Clearly, many utterances that in some contexts are
indefensibly taunting, hostile, cold, rude, or otherwise morally dubious
are merely amusing when stated within a suitably different context. Os
tensible insults and other verbal—or, for that matter, nonverbal—assaults
are a rich source of humor for issuers and recipients alike, whether they
are made orally or otherwise (in email, say), and whether the parties are
alone or observed by others (at a party, or good-natured faculty meeting,
for instance). It is worth noting, too, that many of these re-contextualized
statements are, of course, literally re-statements, recountings of improper
things that people, in some cases the joke-tellers themselves, have al
ready said, and that were most assuredly not funny at the time. Yet while
neither the tellers nor the audiences are under any illusions about their
impropriety, and perhaps hurtfulness, in the original contexts, they nev
ertheless find them funny and benign in the new, joke- or story-telling
contexts. It is this kind of context-sensitivity that is missed by those who
make broad claims about the injuriousness or insultingness of certain
kinds of jokes.34
This is not the occasion for a rigorous and comprehensive typology of
pragmatic factors that shape joking. But we might venture a conjecture
about the contrast between our all-encompassing notion of joke and that
of the joke-in-itself that is embedded within it. Understanding and evalu
ating the joke-in-itself draws upon only a subset of pragmatic factors
(and the competence to comprehend them), those that are more regular,
rule-governed, and context-invariant—among them, perhaps, conven
34E.g., Mills, "Racist and Sexist Jokes," pp. 11, 12. Mills makes a further claim that,
while a person might well be amused by a phthonic joke that targets her personally, she
cannot (unless she is lacking in self-respect) be amused by a joke that targets a sexual or
racial group to which she belongs, because there is no longer any rightly enjoyable per
sonalized attention shown by the joke (ibid.). But surely there can be affectionate group
directed humor that is perceived as such. And this can be enjoyed by an individual group
member (and without loss of dignity) if, very roughly, (1) she has no worries about po
tential baleful consequences of the joke-telling (e.g., spreading the stereotype via others
in the audience), and either (2a) she regards herself as in fact instantiating the relevant
group-stereotyped trait (and this is not a matter of personal consternation or angst for
her), or (2b) she regards herself as not instantiating it and either (2b 1) feels confident that
the other participants know this about her or (2b2) regards the trait as a flattering one
(and her lack of this trait is not a sore spot with her). The point is that being the butt of a
group-directed joke need not be inherently unpleasant, or cause one to want to distance
oneself from the stereotype. Only when certain background contextual circumstances are
in place does the humor disappear.

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tionalized aspects of pragmatic presupposition35 an

plicature.36 Responding to the joke as a whole, how
full range of contextual factors with which we m
joke-teller is communicating. It is these factors th
cern and to describe, that we are not yet accustom
when we ask what something means, and that con
neglected in most analyses of jokes and their effec
attempt to show some greater sensitivity to such f
begin rendering a more accurate depiction of the w
work upon us.
Before we return to that project, let's take this op
force of reflective equilibrium in the opposite dire
commonplace idea about the nature of pragmatic
awkwardly at best with the ordinary realities of jo
the hearer's goal in employing pragmatic methods
"the speaker's communicative intention," that is, "t
in making the utterance," by means of considering
that the hearer can reasonably suppose the speaker
to take into account."37 Now, such techniques are
many interpretive contexts; we do, after all, often
what utterers intend to communicate to us.38 But i
tive? If not, then, ironically, this conception of pr
to suffer from an inadequate appreciation of the v
which we seek to make sense of others' words.
In its favor, such a self-imposed restriction upon the objective of
pragmatics does seem to offer the benefits of a clear goal for the inter
preter, and a helpful demarcation between, on the one hand, the method
ology of pragmatics (and the subject-matter of the corresponding disci
pline), and, on the other, some open-ended realm of idiosyncratic mean
ing extractions or impositions by the diverse range of more and less
competent interpreters, operating with diverse rules, practices, or con
ventions of sense-making. But this benefit is partly spurious, reduced
substantially as it is by the profound uncertainties inherent in the goal of
the utterer's communicative intention. Worse, it is purchased at too great
35E.g., Robert C. Stalnaker, "Pragmatic Presuppositions," reprinted in Steven Davis

(ed.), Pragmatics: A Reader (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 471-81.
36E.g., Paul Grice, Studies in the Way of Words (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer
sity Press, 1989); Laurence Horn, "Implicature," in Robert A. Wilson and Frank C. Keil
(eds.), The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,
1999), pp. 391-94.
37Bach, "The Semantics-Pragmatics Distinction," pp. 72, 74.
38As Recanati notes, "[i]n many cases, what the speaker 'has in mind' is the relevant
factor" ("Pragmatics," p. 626). See also pp. 628-29, describing and supporting the
stronger "intentionalisf ' position.

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a cost. For the sake of what is really just a gain in convenience, pragmat
ics so understood blinds itself to some of the realities of communication,
realities whose understanding no other methodology or discipline is as
well equipped to explicate. Is it not important to study how listeners and
readers take utterances and make meaning that cannot, in any straight
forward way, be viewed as being implanted in them intentionally by ut
terers? Surely it ought not be presupposed that the set of supra
intentional meanings obtained by interpreters is merely a disordered tan
gle of idiosyncrasy, incompetence, and error.
In fact, there are certain familiar interpretive practices that argue for
the existence of systematic processes—not merely semantic, but prag
matic—that aim at producing meanings beyond what utterers have aimed
to convey but that nevertheless do so in a constrained way, according to
shared community norms and standards. One set of examples comprises
practices whose concern is the understanding of texts originating in other
cultures or other historical eras—constitutional and statutory interpreta
tion in law, for instance, or scriptural hermeneutics in religion. But an
other set includes practices that aim at grasping meanings that are con
veyed, though not intended, by utterers who do share a culture and era
with their interpreters. Here, too, law provides examples, for instance in
the construal of contracts and of testimony. But perhaps the best example
is right under our noses: joke-telling. It appears obvious from our earlier
discussion that joke-tellers quite often lack any determinate comprehen
sion of just what it is that makes particular jokes funny. The operations
of their jokes are opaque to them. In such cases, what they intend to con
vey is significantly less than what they do convey—including pragmati
cally. And we must be grateful for this gap; if joke-hearers could under
stand only joke-tellers' intended communications, there would be much
less laughter in the world. Crucial ingredients in making many jokes
funny would be lost.
Let's return, then, to our investigation of the diversity of joke
appreciating situations. In some joking situations, a crucial part of what
provokes our laughter is the lack of wit, sense, wisdom, or tact in the
manner of the teller or in the words of the joke (perhaps supplemented by
the subset of pragmatic factors relevant to the joke-in-itself). Once again,
the potential sources of our amusement here may be multiple. We might
be laughing at the (attitudes of the) real people who seriously avow these
sorts of things. We might be responding, if de Sousa is correct, in accor
dance with the Python principle. Or we might be amused by joke-tellers
flouting our expectations regarding the conventions of joke-telling or
story-telling: the patently nonsensical punch line (e.g., "No soap, ra
dio!"); the determinedly, and obviously, witless punch line (e.g., some
shaggy dog stories); the impassive facial and vocal manner that accom

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panies the recitation of, say, absurd or horrif

Wright); the matter-of-fact recounting of person
Rodney Dangerfield); the revealing of familiar, no
ous, and ordinarily private matters (e.g., Richard P
precious time to utterly mundane matters (e.g.,
Quentin Tarantino movie dialogue).
In a different category are dead-baby jokes, Hele
the tasteless topical jokes that erupt after trage
murders, mass killings, or events like the car-acci
Diana. Surely there are butts to these jokes, as t
individuals or groups that all would recognize as bei
which the jokes are directed (hence the familiar
you make fun of dead babies [blind people, murd
caust victims, ...]??")—but it seems implausible
who find such jokes funny actually endorse the
their butts that the jokes on their surface seem to
again we see at work some of the same processes t
connection with the rape joke earlier: terms taken
and construction of joke-world characters and eve
distinct from real-world ones.
We must also acknowledge that these phthoni
sexist ones included—provide ample opportunity
amused appreciation, of wit.40 Syntactic and sema
manipulated in delightfully unexpected ways. Clev
suppositions and implicatures can be sprung upon
cause this cleverness itself, and that of the hearers
to provoke gratified laughter. Genre jokes must sa
form, within which joke-tellers are challenged t
variations on the theme. Some of these are undeni
others are ingenious and resourceful in drawing
nections, or in adding reflexive commentary upon
genres. Where awareness of the genre is necessary
jokes, we have another illustration of the role play
pragmatic factors.
Once again, there are self-deprecatory jokes, and
expense by others. It takes an over-inflated ego
laughter at one's own expense when the joking is o
perhaps even affectionate, way. Most of us can e
though we (or the groups or categories to which
39See also Gaut, "Just Joking," pp. 55-56.

°On the
40On therole
roleof
of wit in phthonic jokes, see also Goldstein, "H
"Just Joking," p. 63.

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
butts.41 Surely we cannot all be dismissed as "self-hating" women, men,

Jews, blacks, and so on—though the Endorsement Thesis seems to imply
as much. In the right environment, with the right participants, many of us
feel able to enjoy jokes whose humor derives from false denigrating pre
suppositions to which we might elsewhere take offense; in the safe con
text, we do not take these presuppositions seriously. We do not endorse
them, as the Endorsement Thesis would have it—yet we can find the
phthonic joke funny, even where it is directed against us. Jokes based,
for example, upon stereotypes or reputations that are believed by their
objects to be blatantly false or exaggerated are often non-threatening and
enjoyable. (Some of the humor here may lie in a mocking of the be
nighted stereotyping itself.) That the falsity is common knowledge
among those present might also be a necessary condition of enjoyment of
the joke.42 Many of the instances where we do not find humor in deni
grating, and perhaps clever, jokes seem to involve apprehensions that the
joke-tellings or audience reactions express or betray animosity or other
negative attitudes toward us, or that the joke-tellings (or maybe these
joke-tellers on other occasions) are actually condoning or spreading ob
jectionable ideas—rather than that the jokes are otherwise not funny.43
41See also Roberts, "Humor and the Virtues," pp. 140-42; Morreall, Taking Laughter
Seriously, pp. 106-7; Linda Naranjo-Huebl, "From Peek-a-Boo to Sarcasm: Women's
Humor as a Means of Both Connection and Resistance," Studies in Prolife Feminism
1(1995) <http://www.fhsa.org/vln4/huebl.html (Feb. 20, 2004)>; but see Bergmann,
"How Many Feminists Does It Take to Make a Joke?" pp. 75-79.
42Notice that to say that the falsity of the joke's explicit and implicit allegations are
common knowledge among those present is to say more than that every person present
regards them as false. It is to say, further, at least that they all regard the others as regard
ing the allegations as false, and regard the others as all regarding everyone as regarding
the allegations as false. The reason for this additional stipulation is that if all parties pre
sent do regard the allegations against me as false, yet I suspect that some of them do not,
or I suspect that some of them suspect that there are those among us who do not, I might
still be troubled in a laughter-inhibiting way by the potential adverse attitudes or conse
quences.
43It is an interesting further question whether we can laugh when we take the joke
directed at us to involve presuppositions that are both true and legitimately denigrating,
or presuppositions that we suspect the joke-teller or other joke-hearers deem to be both
true and legitimately denigrating. There may be, that is, two distinct routes here to our not
being amused by a joke that targets us: (1) if the joke, by pointing out or implying some
thing shameful that we believe or suspect to be true about ourselves, causes us to feel bad
about ourselves, regardless of whether others credit the allegation or think badly of what
it alleges; (2) if we worry that the joke may cause others to (further) dislike or look down
at us, regardless of whether we think their attitudes justified. (See also n. 34 above, re
garding group-directed phthonic jokes, and Bergmann, "How Many Feminists Does It
Take to Make a Joke?" p. 79 n. 15, on how "humor can foster a sense of community of
belief and values," including disparaging ones. For interesting suggestions about how
jokes can insult or ridicule, and how phthonic humor can spread group-denigrating feel
ings as well as beliefs, see Philips, "Racist Acts and Racist Humor," pp. 12-16. On feel

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
That is, the failure to laugh may be a response t

conveyed by the joke-telling, or to its potential con
to the joke itself, which might have been laughed at
ent circumstances.
This variation in our reactions to jokes that target us suggests that it is
the perceived states of mind of the joke-teller and the audience members
that is the crucial factor that sometimes precludes amusement at a joke—
not the content of the joke itself. (The same point can be made by the
above-mentioned joking context in which one dependable non-sexist tells
another an apparently sexist joke. Once some doubt seeps into the joke
hearer's mind about the non-sexist credentials of the teller or of other
audience members, the opportunity for humor is lost.) The same general
principle explains also why we sometimes do not enjoy phthonic jokes
even when we are not their targets. We might be concerned about the
apparent expression of animosity that lurks behind the joke, even though
the animosity is not directed at us. We might be disturbed by the malice
or cruelty that we take ourselves to be witnessing, or the insensitivity,
and further disturbed by our potential contribution to it, our implicit en
couragement of future expressions of it. We might be anxious about be
ing taken to agree with whatever denigrating assumptions underlie the
joke—or becoming ourselves a target if we overtly dissociate ourselves
from them. Or we might be worried, our concern for the butt aside, about
the prospective malignant consequences of the joke-telling—for instance,
if it seems to be likely, in the situation, to reinforce other audience mem
bers' animosities against the individual or group target. But none of this
is necessarily connected to the content of the joke-in-itself, as shown by
the fact that the very same joke, heard in another context, might later be
found to be amusing by the same persons who were earlier troubled or
appalled by it.
The sorts of factors just mentioned, by the way, explain why many of
us find ourselves recurrently drawn back to judging that certain kinds of
jokes—Holocaust or racist jokes, say—are simply so harsh and ugly that
they are not, and ought never be, amusing. With jokes of these kinds,
amusement-suppressing factors like these are routinely at work in ordi
nary circumstances. So, when it comes time to reflect upon such jokes,
and we call to mind such ordinary circumstances (or perhaps review an
impersonal listing of the jokes, on the Internet for instance), we see no
humor in the jokes and we are led to render our critical judgments of
them. But in such cases we have reached these judgments only by over
looking the atypical situations in which such jokes can indeed be
ing pressured to join in put-down humor at one's own expense, see Harvey, "Humor as
Social Act," pp. 28-29; Morreall, Taking Laughter Seriously, p. 117.)

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
enjoyed.
So the contents of jokes do not determine our responses to them. We
sometimes find humor in jokes even where we do not endorse their
premises. And we sometimes do not enjoy jokes even where we do en
dorse their premises, for the "truth" of the joke need not assuage other
concerns we have about its telling. Alternatively, we may be unable to
laugh at the joke, whether phthonic or otherwise, because we cannot
keep ourselves from giving its words (or the teller's nonverbal contribu
tions) a "deep" construal that involves disturbing ideas or imagery. For
instance, when hearing a dead-baby joke, we might be unable, or unwill
ing, to suppress distinctly unamusing memories if we have recently
grieved over the loss of a child—even if not our own, and even if merely
a fictional character. Are we ever rightly liable to moral criticism for
such an inability to be amused? It is certainly tempting to find fault with
those, say, who refuse to allow themselves to enjoy any humor that refers
to a dead baby—or even any humor, period—on account of all the babies
dying around the world every day, or to enjoy any joke whose butt is fe
male on account of their unrelenting indignation at the ongoing oppres
sion of women. The principle on which such people deny themselves
humor would, if applied consistently, eliminate humor entirely.44 On the
other hand, there is something admirably serious-minded, even noble,
about such self-abnegation, at least if it contributes in some fashion,
however indirect, to ameliorating the conditions that concern it. And we
can certainly find virtue in incapacities for amusement that are less ex
treme: a tendency to find humor in genocides or natural disasters as they
unfold, or even in the grave disappointments of friends or loved ones,
may require an extraordinary explanation if it is not to bespeak a lack of
compassion or other character flaw. In any case, endorsement is obvi
ously not sufficient for finding a joke funny, in addition to not being nec
essary. The relation between endorsement and amusement is apparently
not a straightforward, uncomplicated one.
More important, our review of the varied impediments to enjoyment
of phthonic jokes does actually advance our case against the Endorse
ment Thesis. For any advocate of that principle must explain how it can
be true, even while a generalized version of it seems not to apply to non
phthonic jokes. Why, if as joke-hearers we can be expected generally to
make temporary suppositions that run contrary to our considered beliefs,
can we suddenly not do so where phthonic jokes are concerned? Why
cannot we suspend disbelief in this domain, too—temporarily forget
some of what we know on the topic in question, and temporarily adopt
premises that we do not reflectively endorse—in order to enjoy the
4See also Goldstein, "Humor and Harm," p. 32.

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC 12:34:56 UTC
jokes? De Sousa notes the apparent inconsistency,45

an adequate psychological rationale for it. He appea
distinction is supported by the evidence that we e
inhibitory barrier in the case of phthonic humor
jokes fall flat when we reject their (phthonic) assu
that does not pose problems for non-phthonic hum
diagnosis of the distinctive way that phthonic hum
main-specific Endorsement Thesis might indeed lo
have discerned additional amusement-inhibiting for
case of phthonic jokes, but that do not depend upo
dorsing the jokes' phthonic assumptions. Even whe
incides with that of non-endorsement, it appears to
non-endorsements, that do the explanatory work o
failures to laugh. So it seems that we have shifted
back to those who support a domain-specific princ
ment Thesis.
3. The Contexts Make the Sexist
In light of the foregoing, we might do best to distinguish two claim

within the Endorsement Thesis: (ET1) that jokes regarded as being se
ist, or at least as prototypically so, call upon sexist assumptions for them
to make humorous sense; and (ET2) that whatever the assumptions re
quired for appreciation of a joke (whether sexist or not), these cannot be
merely entertained or supposed, but must be affirmatively endorsed by
hearers of the joke before they can find it funny. Now, our dissection of
the rape joke, a joke that de Sousa takes, not unreasonably, to be proto
typically sexist, indicates that the first of these claims is sometimes, and
perhaps often, false. It may be that many jokes that are regarded as sexist
are not actually so—indeed, that many jokes that are taken to be phthoni
are not actually so. We have also examined evidence that casts doubt
upon the second claim. But for present purposes let's simply grant both
of these claims, so that we may address the subsequent question of
whether endorsing the sexist presuppositions of a joke makes a person
sexist.
So, we will now assume that the Endorsement Thesis is true—that
where there exist sexist assumptions required for a certain kind of appre
ciation of a joke, these cannot be merely entertained or supposed, bu
must be affirmatively endorsed by hearers of the joke before they can
find it funny. Does it follow that those who find the joke funny are them
selves sexist?

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
No. I will argue in this final section that even if certain humor is ac
cessible only to those who possess an undeniably sexist outlook during
the period in which they respond to the joke, these people need not be
actual sexists.
Now, this position is not unprecedented. Lawrence Blum, for one, has
issued similar claims to those that I am making, only transposed to racist,
rather than sexist, humor. He states that "[t]he making of a racist joke ...
does not make someone 'a racist'. It does not even necessarily signify a
racist attitude or belief."46 Blum's discussion indicates only one escape
route from such damning implications (one that would apply to joke
appreciators as well as joke-tellers): ignorance of the joke's racist nature.
Yet we have already surveyed numerous other grounds in support of the
second kind of claim that he makes. And now we will consider a non
ignorance argument for the first, one that turns instead upon the substan
tial cognitive and ethical gulf that separates endorsement of a sexist (or
racist) view on the occasion of hearing a joke from being a sexist more
generally.
In brief, my position is this: due to the divided nature of human cog
nitive systems, non-sexists—even confirmed anti-sexists—are capable of
employing sexist standpoints in limited situations, for limited periods,
without this lending any pervasive sexist cast to their overall, global be
lief systems or personalities. A man whose serious, considered, and be
haviorally actualized views are anything but sexist can nevertheless, for
instance, continue to access, and use (and endorse), his uninformed boy
hood misconceptions about women, sex, and rape for purposes of enjoy
ing sexist humor, while maintaining a strict compartmentalization of
these ideas that keeps them from infecting his thinking in other prag
matic contexts.
We have concerned ourselves heretofore exclusively with occurrent
mental states, those involved in moment-to-moment mental processes
and experiences. We have been asking, in effect, "What, right here and
now, is going on in the joke-hearer's mind that causes him or her to find
this joke funny?" But the larger question that we have set out to an
swer—Need one be sexist to laugh at a sexist joke?—obviously requires
a judgment about the global property of "being sexist," a trait that char
acterizes a person as a whole, and not merely at one moment. We need,
therefore, some account of how properly to make such global attribu
tions.
I propose to turn for guidance to the manner in which we ascribe be
liefs, where beliefs are understood as global characteristics of persons.
46Lawrence Blum, "I'm Not a Racist, But... The Moral Quandary of Race (Ithaca,
N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2002), p. 17.

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
(True, we sometimes do use the term "believe," and it

to transitory occurrent states; but the central, and mo
the term is to ascribe stable doxastic commitments th
across time and can be activated repeatedly from
storage for purposes of occurrent cognizing.) Beliefs
selves to us for this purpose not simply because of t
They are also an appropriate reference point for u
largely, if not entirely, a matter of holding certain be
to understand how sexism is ascribed to individuals,
be well advised to begin by understanding how the
beliefs.
The story I am going to tell about belief attributio
one, but I trust that it will ring true, as its composit
by the goal of being faithful to very familiar, yet of
ences that strongly suggest that our cognitive system
vided or compartmentalized. The philosophical tradit
the unified, integrated, fully consistent mind as the n
and also, less plausibly, as the descriptive norm, the
default to be presumed except in instances of malfun
vidual philosophers who have thought this to be wishf
alistic, thinking have tended not to get very far beyo
or Lewis Carroll on inconsistency, and have said littl
partmentalized cognitive system might actually operat
If we reflect, however, upon the pervasiveness of t
sion-based forgetting of things that we know (and al
partial viewpoints that we deem unacceptable or false
points, and our assumption of situation-elicited perso
corporate our full personalities and are sometimes
from one another), we come to see that a fundamenta
nitive endowments is that most of their contents are d
time—so much so that they are sometimes unavaila
even to assist in thinking about topics that they direct
tem, like so much of our psychological wiring, is adm
responses and flexible in adapting to the many sudde
task that we undergo through daily life, yet also syst
certain kinds of errors.
In effect, the individual person's cognitive system
grated. That is, our cognitive endowment, the pool of
memory for utilization in thinking, is not a single fu
47For a defense of the corresponding claim in the case of ra

Lengbeyer, "Racism and Impure Hearts," in Michael P. Levine a
Racism in Mind (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2004), pp

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
and all assets are available to be activated whenever relevant to our cur
rent topic of cognition. Rather than provide in such fashion a single per
spective upon the world, the endowment is functionally compartmental
ized in a complex pattern that actually supports many distinct, partial,
partly overlapping, situation-triggered, and sometimes mutually inconsis
tent, "perspects."4S The stream of cognizing involves a continual shifting
from one perspect to another, as differing subsets of our representational
resources get activated for the pragmatic task at hand. In short, our
standpoint keeps changing. How we think or behave in one kind of set
ting is no sure indicator of how we think or behave in a different one.
Indeed, we can even sometimes be found reasoning earnestly in perspect
PI with a premise that is contradictory to its counterpart that we ear
nestly employ in P2. The cognitive endowment is thus not aptly charac
terized as a "belief system," for it includes many items that, taking into
account how we think, feel, perceive, and behave across the diversity of
situations—especially those situations deemed in our culture most re
vealing of people's authentic doxastic commitments—cannot rightly be
regarded as our beliefs. Yet these non-beliefs are regular ingredients in
our reasonings and other occurrent mental processes. We use them, for
one thing, in a variety of "belief-resembling activities"—such as making
believe, playing devil's advocate, venting emotions verbally, and talking
off the top of our heads—each of which involves us in avowing, reason
ing with, or otherwise using, earnestly and unhesitatingly, sentences that
(outside of the activity, or during lapses from it) we deem to be false, or
at least do not deem to be true.
A straightforward inference to draw from this evidence is that there is
a single basic occurrent cognitive state that underlies all cognizing activi
ties, whether belief-using or belief-resembling: the mere utilization of a
sentence as an instrument in reasoning or other thinking, without any
inherent accompanying epistemic evaluation—what we can call "accept
ance."49 For example, despite our overall, considered, readily accessible
opinion that p is false, we find ourselves able to argue, as a devil's advo
cate, in favor of it. How is this possible? It would seem that actual utili
zation of p in reasoning and as a (perhaps unintended) influencer of our
feelings and perceptions requires that at the actual moment of cognizing
we forget or omit whatever qualms we may have about p's truth value.
That is, we need not, and so do not, affirmatively endorse as true all the
items that we actually deploy in cognizing; we simply go ahead and use
them, setting aside whatever skeptical thoughts we might have about
48Lengbeyer, "Racism and Impure Hearts," p. 168.

49The notion that I am deploying is not identical to the notion of acceptance that is
found elsewhere in the philosophical literature. See, e.g., L. Jonathan Cohen, An Essay on
Belief and Acceptance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).

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them from the vantage point of other of our perspe

this picture of cognition is provided by "infiltrati
that infíltrate their ways into our cognitive endowm
incorporated into occurrent cognizing of all sorts,
ing assented to them or judged them to be true or
nett points out, "Sometimes we salt away a senten
sound of it,... or just because it has a sort of stayi
nation."50 We might speculate that many of the sex
in the minds of those who repudiate them are just s
Given this conception of cognition, how can we
butions of ordinary, full-fledged, global belief? W
attributions aim at picking out not all the sentence
recurrently, accept (i.e., use in our cognizing) or e
but only those that dependably govern our minds d
"defining moments" deemed in our culture to b
true convictions. Hence, beliefs are those senten
disposed to) display the appropriate "acceptance pr
of cognizing contexts in which we find ourselves.
concept in this way, we are able to be realistic in r
sity of cognitive postures a person will adopt, whi
that, in actual practice, the most important indica
ity is the kinds of situations in which it appears. W
by a too-lenient standard to recognize too many
beliefs = everything that we endorse recurrently,
liably reject in situations of, say, sober, earnest, a
tion), or being pressed by a too-strict standard to r
beliefs = only items that we endorse and that neve
dorsements or their obvious entailments).
Parallel advantages would seem to invite us to
ceptions to other cognitive states—such as suspecti
to mental traits that are at least substantially nonc
desire, anger, envy, longing, maybe happiness, and
ing sexist. These, too, appear quite plausibly to be
person that are constituted from weighted occurr
various kinds of context, according to cultural norm
are none too well-defined. Proper attribution of ea
require a certain pattern over time of circums
thoughts, behaviors, feelings, and perceptions. In
lated snapshot can distinguish the global trait from
kind of occurrent manifestation out of which it is
50Daniel C. Dennett, Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays o

(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1978), p. 47.

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believing that p and accepting that p cannot be so distinguished. Each is

subject to borderline cases, and susceptible to controversy among ob
servers hailing from (sub)cultures that maintain differing standards of
attribution.
Neglecting this complex structure of such a trait, and instead ascrib
ing the trait based upon one occurrent episode or a narrow and improp
erly unrepresentative range of them, is liable to produce attributions that
are not as useful for prediction of people's behaviors, feelings, percep
tions, and thoughts, and are even, in some cases, unfair. Consider "being
sexist." It is not uncommon for someone to be labeled as such merely on
the basis of utterances voiced in very limited, and arguably peripheral,
situations: when joshing with buddies on a fishing trip, maybe, or when
reminiscing at the reunion of a high school class whose graduation ante
dated the spread of feminist ideas—or when laughing at a supposedly
sexist joke.51 Once made, the attribution can have a firm reality of its
own, and be used to re-interpret occasions of apparent non- or anti
sexism as instead insincere or otherwise unrepresentative of his outlook.
Yet this person might be genuinely divided among differing outlooks on
the moral status of women, and during defining moments might even
tend to inhabit his non- or anti-sexist side. It might be only for the most
restricted purposes that he mobilizes and accepts the relevant sexist atti
tudes, and suppresses the countervailing ones, even only for appreciating
humor of this sort.52 (Again, there are people who, despite deeming the
Holocaust a horrific, profoundly disturbing, and extremely important
event in history and even in their own lives, nevertheless enjoy laughing
at Holocaust humor.) He maintains multiple sets of attitudes: maybe he
51 Do such examples of real-world attributions, which clearly depart from my own

conception about how attributions are ordinarily (and rationally) made, indicate the fal
sity of that conception? In no way. For notice that the illustrative ascriptions of sexism
are based upon minimal evidence—evidence confined to one situational context, or per
haps a few. Such ascriptions can reveal either a principled position that any occurrent
sexist manifestation is sufficient for a global attribution of sexism (contrary to my own
view), or simply the unremarkable practice of jumping to conclusions, or educated
guesses, based upon very limited information. I suspect that both of these are in operation
in real-world cases: some people have what I regard as misguided understandings of sex
ism (and of the attribution of such concepts), perhaps linked to an erroneous conception
of the mind and personality as well-integrated entities whose parts are mutually consis
tent; while some do recognize that a conclusive attributional judgment requires examina
tion of someone's broader acceptance profile, but they formulate provisional judgments
without waiting for all the evidence to come in.
"Roberts notes, likewise, the possibility of "a confirmed feminist, who ... is not a
sexist, but occasionally takes what William James calls a 'moral holiday' and enjoys
playfully presenting himself (to himself and others) as a sexist. If the playful mode is
seriously mistaken by somebody for serious sexism, or if he finds himself sliding into
serious sexism, he becomes alarmed and ceases to enjoy the joke" ("Humor and the Vir
tues," pp. 135-36).

182.255.0.242 on Thu, 26 Aug 2021 14:15:34 UTC
formerly used sexist premises more widely, and h

nated them from other realms of cognizing; mayb
inclined toward sexism, but learned (during adoles
a new community) that adopting certain non-belie
sary for appreciating humor of this sort. His seriou
diametrically opposed to these attitudes, and he
conducting himself, and his thoughts, in a non-sex
public and private realms. Or he might have u
management measures aimed at preventing a parti
from influencing his cognition (such as working t
vations or to catch himself whenever he notice
thought is being shaped by it), and the measures mi
not perfectly, effective.53 It might even be that h
representations in his cognitive endowment, but s
requisite denigrating attitudes on the spot in a belie
like make-believe or devil's advocacy, solely for th
ating the humor. In cases of these types, he can
"sexist" despite his reaction of laughter to a sexist
maintained by the Endorsement Thesis) this rea
dorsement of sexist premises.
It may seem that any man who deserves to be reg
let alone anti-sexist, could be asked to know abo
ized sexist attitudes and to eradicate them entirely
If they persist, then he must not be a non-sexist, after
reject this reasoning, because it is based upon a fal
we are capable of eradicating from our cognitive e
ments that we repudiate when we appraise them fr
spects. It seems that such eradication lies beyond o
many cases.54 Hence, all that we can fairly ask of
is that he manage his cognitive system so as to ins
(though still contextually useful) elements do not g
their rightful pragmatic contexts.
De Sousa, it should be noted, does take a step or
direction being advocated here, and away from the
[C]ommunity ... sometimes seems to be convertible with the

... After long enough among the natives, the anthropologist m
of community to laugh at their jokes, even though in sober co
their attitudes. She may not really endorse, for example, the v
and pigeons are pure, even if she laughs at local jokes based on
of community can substitute for... the genuine adoption of an a
53See Lengbeyer, "Racism and Impure Hearts."

54Ibid.
55De Sousa, The Rationality of Emotion, pp. 292-93.

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The phenomenon that de Sousa describes here is readily, and profitably,

restated in terms of the perspect account as follows: The anthropologist
does not believe that chickens are dirty; this is not her considered view
that she activates in the defining moments that we regard as indicative of
people's global doxastic commitments. Yet she is capable of accepting
(and endorsing) in limited contexts that chickens are dirty, and it is this
capacity that enables her to share in the humor of her host people.
In closing, we can return briefly to the question that was encountered
earlier—whether a joke's implicit premises need to be actively endorsed
for the joke to be found funny, or whether some lesser commitment to
them can suffice—with our account of divided cognition in hand. De
Sousa sets out three varieties of stance that we can take toward a proposi
tion, p, that is presupposed by a given phthonic joke. We can, at one ex
treme, merely recognize that p is presupposed; or we can attempt to sup
pose that p for the sake of the joke (de Sousa calls this "hypothetically
adopting]," "hypothetically entertain[ing]," "going along with," or
"imagining that we share" p); or we can "actually share" p by endorsing
it ourselves, "view[ing] it as true."56 Only the last of these can suffice to
evoke amusement at the joke, according to de Sousa; the others are
doomed to be unavailing. But in light of the perspect account of cogni
tion, it would appear that de Sousa has overlooked a fourth possible dis
position that we might take towardp: accepting it unquestioningly for the
duration of the joke, but without affirmatively regarding it as true. We
can simply suspend concern with its truth value—as we might do when
engrossed in a period of make-believe, Method acting, or psychothera
peutic role-playing (a practice that de Sousa mentions,57 but whose sig
nificance he does not fully appreciate). By contrast with the standard
case of supposing that p,58 we lose track for the time being of our consid
ered conviction that p is false, and lose ourselves in a temporarily
adopted standpoint, in the way that an actor, make-believer, or role
player might "get into" character.59
56Ibid„ pp. 290-92,156-58.

"Ibid., p. 157.
58I have no stake in the particular terminology or classification scheme that I am us
ing here. I would have no objection if someone were to insist upon a broader standard
notion of "supposing that p"—one that does not invariably include repeated moments of
self-awareness that one is merely supposing that p, as does the notion that I employ in the
text—and therefore were to say, not that de Sousa overlooks a fourth possible sentential
attitude, but that he underestimates the potential uses and power of supposition.
"Roberts espouses a similar conception of the cognitive activity involved here, sug
gesting that "we can play at thinking with the sexists" ("Humor and the Virtues," p. 138):
"To find the humor funny, you must adopt the perspective of those who are ... sexist ...
But this does not mean that you adopt the corresponding beliefs. Instead, you 'see the
world' temporarily through those propositions, much in the way you may entertain an

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If this is right, then we can demand of some

Sousa's position that she defend the second prong
Thesis by doing more than establishing that mere
sition that p cannot suffice for finding a joke fun
explain why the fourth, "make-believe" attitude t
required by the joke cannot suffice to engage us eno
Lawrence Lengbeyer
Department ot Leadership, bthics
United States Naval Acade
lengbeye@usna.edu
interpretation of a text that you do not believe to be the correct

you ... 'enter into' the world of the ... sexist... But ... it is n
firmed in that perspective, to be an endorser of it, to be a belie
Perhaps David Benatar also has something like this in min
we can "recognize" a stereotype, and thereby enjoy a sexist (e.g
without actually endorsing it ("Prejudice in Jest," pp. 48-50).
tion" does not seem adequate to the psychological immersion
fleeting, that I am (along with Roberts) claiming is needed f
tar's illustrations—of his own amusement at jokes whose und
stereotypes he does not endorse—supply clear guidance, due
of "endorse": without a distinction between the global endor
one's considered position or full-fledged belief, and the mer
dorsement for purposes of enjoying a joke, Benatar's exampl
sion that joke enjoyment is possible without endorsement of t
tar's examples do tell against de Sousa's suggestion that bein
proves that one globally ascribes to the underlying assumpt
seem, also against de Sousa's claim that such amusement sh
they lack force against the weaker (but still, I think, too str
being amused proves that one occurrently regards them as tru
modified stance on the unavoidability of endorsement, a diffe
needed.

182.25:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff on Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC

Humor, Context, Divided Cognition

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Humor, Context, Divided Cognition

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Humor, Context, and Divided Cognition

Author(s): Lawrence Lengbeyer

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23558520

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Need one be sexist to laugh at a sexist joke? Racist to laugh at a racist

1. The Anatomy of a Sexist Joke

In his book The Rationality of Emotion, de Sousa highlights a particular

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(de Sousa writes as if these features are inherent c

M. visits the hockey team. When she emerges she complains

De Sousa points out that "the joke seems to imply cer

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assess accurately the feelings and motivations of t

14These student joke-hearers evidently reasoned backward

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athletic young women.

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ignorantly takes "rape" to mean "sex" (a concept that

l9For an impressively thorough survey of the benefits of laugh

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sessment depends upon further premises, such as that the joke-hearers do

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understood by hearers as implying not that a youn

2. The Context Makes the Joke

We have found it to be anything but straightforward to discern just what

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The essential insight behind this critique is Wittgensteinian or Tver

24Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, 3rd ed., trans. G.E.M. Ans

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maybe eagerly (by this particular person or person

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29Martin Davies, quoted in Kent Bach, "The Semantics-Pragmatics Distinction: What

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contexts: textual, conversational, interactional, situat

31Gaut ("Just Joking," p. 54) suggests that we imaginatively su

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tionalized aspects of pragmatic presupposition35 an

35E.g., Robert C. Stalnaker, "Pragmatic Presuppositions," reprinted in Steven Davis

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panies the recitation of, say, absurd or horrif

39See also Gaut, "Just Joking," pp. 55-56.

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butts.41 Surely we cannot all be dismissed as "self-hating" women, men,

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That is, the failure to laugh may be a response t

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4See also Goldstein, "Humor and Harm," p. 32.

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jokes? De Sousa notes the apparent inconsistency,45

3. The Contexts Make the Sexist

In light of the foregoing, we might do best to distinguish two claim

45De Sousa, The Rationality of Emotion, p. 290.

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(True, we sometimes do use the term "believe," and it

47For a defense of the corresponding claim in the case of ra

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48Lengbeyer, "Racism and Impure Hearts," p. 168.

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them from the vantage point of other of our perspe

50Daniel C. Dennett, Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays o