The Performativity of Flatulence

(Excerpts from a Very Academic Analysis of Funny Noises, or Bruits Comiques)

Boing. Brrrraaaaaap. Thbthtbthbthbthbthbth.

What makes a noise ‘funny’? Funny noises, or bruits comiques are an under-theorized category of sound. They defy contexts and transcend cultural mores. They are stateless and permeate barriers. They detonate walls. In tracing genealogies of bruits comiques, we are theorizing performances that refuse to be contained. Funny noises cause laughter by enacting a force on the receiver. They are, in the Austinian sense, performative. Laughter is an affective response to these sounds in a performance that entangles the aural with the corporeal, and bypasses visuality. Funny noises indicate a liberatory potential, which is explored below within the therapeutic space of psychoanalysis by Mara Sidoli, with her patient Peter.  First, let us consider the etymology of the word humor, and identify what humor might produce.

Humor, Kant and The Social Contract of Laughter

Humor comes from the Latin humere (humid), humor (moist) and umor (moisture, liquid). It has classically referred to bodily fluids, a state of mind, whim or fancy. What does humor produce? A plethora of ponderous pluralities, including but not limited to laughter, sociality, and disruption. Kant describes laughter as “an affectation arising from the sudden transformation of a strained expectation into nothing.” Laughter for Kant is a form of release. Humor produces a release, in the Kantian sense. When individuals gather together around the humorous instigations of a performance, they enact a public by producing sociality: a public sharing a response, a laugh. Multiple people are laughing at a singular moment, in a social contract or agreement. The physiological response of the public to humor is a social, corporeal contract. “Hahaha” is “we agree”: laughter is a corporeal contract. It’s also a productive disruption. Laughter disrupts breathing. In other words, laughter disrupts everyday life to produce the social.

Perlocution or Illocution? The Performativity of Bodily Noises

The British philosopher of language J. L. Austin describes a perlocutionary act as that “which is the achieving of certain effects by saying something.” Could a funny noise be classified as perlocutionary when it achieves a humorous effect?  It performs something on the receiver. We are arguing for the performativity of a non-sense speech act of the body, destabilizing Austin’s speech-act as one that only emanates from the mouth. If locutionary acts are statements that mean something, and a bodily noise refuses meaning, then a bodily noise (or funny noise) does not possess a locutionary force or meaning. An illocutionary act possesses a conventional force. A bodily noise is conventional, in that it is expected and common. However, depending on the heterogeneity of its production, it disrupts convention. No longer conventional it cannot be considered illocutionary. Rather, a bodily noise produces a perlocutionary force, which acts on the receiver. This perlocutionary performance is rehearsed within the space of psychoanalysis by Mara Sidoli in a case study published in the Journal of Analytical Psychology[1].

Psychoanalysis and Simulated Flatus (or Fartifice)

Jungian psychoanalyst Mara Sidoli reports on her sessions with a 7 year-old child, Peter. His communication strategy involved fart sounds, and actual farts. Multiple sound events are described by Sidoli. One is mimetic, or the reproduction of the sound of flatulence with the mouth. The other poietic, the bodily sound and materiality produced by the mouth-anus. During one session, when Peter was communicating through farts and fart sounds, Sidoli responded with her own fart noises. At first, this distressed Peter. Then he became amused, and laughed. This performance within the space of Jungian psychoanalysis is an illuminating example, in a peer-reviewed journal, of the translinguistic performativity of the simulated fart. In simulating flatus, Sidoli engaged in a discourse with her patient that refused illocutionary conventions, and opened up communicative possibilities through its perlocutionary action. In other words, the adoption of simulated fart sounds as a shared playful language within a therapeutic space positively impacted the mental health of the patient.

[1] "Farting as a Defence against Unspeakable Dread." Journal of Analytical Psychology, vol. 41, no. 2, 1996, pp. 165-178

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1465-5922.1996.00165.x

References

Austin, J. L. How to Do Things with Words. Harvard University Press, 1962.

Kant, Immanuel et al. Kant's Critique of Judgement. Translated, with Introduction and Notes, by Jh Bernard... Revised. Macmillan & Company, 1914.

Sidoli, Mara. "Farting as a Defence against Unspeakable Dread." Journal of Analytical Psychology, vol. 41, no. 2, 1996

Excerpt from ‘He-Gassen/Fart-Battle’ scroll, Unknown Artist(s), Edo Period, Japan
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hegassen_scroll.jpg