On Joking Relationships
Author(s): A. R. Radcliffe-Brown
Source: Africa: Journal of the International African Institute , Jul., 1940, Vol. 13, No. 3
(Jul., 1940), pp. 195-210
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the International African
Institute
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1156093
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[ 95]
ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
A. R. RADCLIFFE-BROWN
HE publication of Mr. F. J. Pedler's noteI on what
I 'joking relationships ', following on two other paper
same subject by Professor Henri Labouret2 and Mademoise
Paulme,3 suggests that some general theoretical discussion of th
of these relationships may be of interest to readers of Afri
What is meant by the term 'joking relationship' is a
between two persons in which one is by custom permit
some instances required, to tease or make fun of the othe
turn is required to take no offence. It is important to disti
main varieties. In one the relation is symmetrical; each
persons teases or makes fun of the other. In the other var
relation is asymmetrical; A jokes at the expense of B and B
teasing good humouredly but without retaliating; or A
much as he pleases and B in return teases A only a little. T
many varieties in the form of this relationship in differen
In some instances the joking or teasing is only verbal, i
includes horse-play; in some the joking includes elements of
in others not.
Standardized social relationships of this kind are extrem
spread, not only in Africa but also in Asia, Oceania an
America. To arrive at a scientific understanding of the ph
it is necessary to make a wide comparative study. Some m
this now exists in anthropological literature, though by n
that could be desired, since it is unfortunately still only rarely
relationships are observed and described as exactly as they
'Joking Relationships in East Africa ', Africa, vol. xiii, p. 170.
2 ' La Parente a Plaisanteries en Afrique Occidentale ', Africa, vol. ii
3 'Parente a Plaisanteries et Alliance par le Sang en Afrique Oc
Africa, vol. xii, p. 433.
4 Professor Marcel Mauss has published a brief theoretical discu
subject in the Annuaire de l'lcole Pratique des Hautes 1ttudes, Section
religieuses, 1927-8. It is also dealt with by Dr. F. Eggan in Social Anth
North American Tribes, 1937, pp. 75-81.
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196 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
The joking relationship is a peculiar combination
and antagonism. The behaviour is such that in any ot
text it would express and arouse hostility; but it is not
and must not be taken seriously. There is a pretence
a real friendliness. To put it in another way, the relat
permitted disrespect. Thus any complete theory of it
or consistent with, a theory of the place of respect in
and in social life generally. But this is a very wide and
sociological problem; for it is evident that the whole
a social order depends upon the appropriate kind and
spect being shown towards certain persons, thin
symbols.
Examples of joking relationships between relatives by marriage are
very commonly found in Africa and in other parts of the world.
Thus Mademoiselle PaulmeI records that among the Dogon a man
stands in a joking relationship to his wife's sisters and their daughters.
Frequently the relationship holds between a man and both the brothers
and sisters of his wife. But in some instances there is a distinction
whereby a man is on joking terms with his wife's younger brothers
and sisters but not with those who are older than she is. This joking
with the wife's brothers and sisters is usually associated with a custom
requiring extreme respect, often partial or complete avoidance,
between a son-in-law and his wife's parents.2
The kind of structural situation in which the associated customs of
joking and avoidance are found may be described as follows. A
marriage involves a readjustment of the social structure whereby the
woman's relations with her family are greatly modified and she enters
into a new and very close relation with her husband. The latter is at
the same time brought into a special relation with his wife's family,
to which, however, he is an outsider. For the sake of brevity though
at the risk of over-simplification, we will consider only the husband's
relation to his wife's family. The relation can be described as involvAfrica,
vol. xii, p. 438.
2 Those who are not familiar with these widespread customs will find descriptions
in Junod, Life of a South African Tribe, Neuchatel, vol. i, pp. 229-37, and in
Social Anthropology of North American Tribes, edited by F. Eggan, Chicago, I937,
PP. 55-7
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 197
ing both attachment and separation, both social conjun
disjunction, if I may use the terms. The man has h
position in the social structure, determined for him b
a certain family, lineage or clan. The great body of
duties and the interests and activities that he shares with others are
the result of his position. Before the marriage his wife's family are
outsiders for him as he is an outsider for them. This constitutes a
social disjunction which is not destroyed by the marriage. The social
conjunction results from the continuance, though in altered form, of
the wife's relation to her family, their continued interest in her and in
her children. If the wife were really bought and paid for, as ignorant
persons say that she is in Africa, there would be no place for any
permanent close relation of a man with his wife's family. But though
slaves can be bought, wives cannot.
Social disjunction implies divergence of interests and therefore the
possibility of conflict and hostility, while conjunction requires the
avoidance of strife. How can a relation which combines the two be
given a stable, ordered form ? There are two ways of doing this. One
is to maintain between two persons so related an extreme mutual
respect and a limitation of direct personal contact. This is exhibited
in the very formal relations that are, in so many societies, characteristic
of the behaviour of a son-in-law on the one side and his wife's father
and mother on the other. In its most extreme form there is complete
avoidance of any social contact between a man and his mother-in-law.
This avoidance must not be mistaken for a sign of hostility. One
does, of course, if one is wise, avoid having too much to do with one's
enemies, but that is quite a different matter. I once asked an Australian
native why he had to avoid his mother-in-law, and his reply was
'Because she is my best friend in the world; she has given me my
wife'. The mutual respect between son-in-law and parents-in-law is
a mode of friendship. It prevents conflict that might arise through
divergence of interest.
The alternative to this relation of extreme mutual respect and restraint
is the joking relationship, one, that is, of mutual disrespect and
licence. Any serious hostility is prevented by the playful antagonism
of teasing, and this in its regular repetition is a constant expression
or reminder of that social disjunction which is one of the essential
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198 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
components of the relation, while the social conjunctio
by the friendliness that takes no offence at insult.
The discrimination within the wife's family between t
to be treated with extreme respect and those with whom i
be disrespectful is made on the basis of generation an
seniority within the generation. The usual respecte
those of the first ascending generation, the wife's mo
sisters, the wife's father and his brothers, sometim
mother's brother. The joking relatives are those of
generation; but very frequently a distinction of senior
generation is made; a wife's older sister or brother m
while those younger will be teased.
In certain societies a man may be said to have relative
long before he marries and indeed as soon as he is
world. This is provided by the institution of the requir
tial marriage. We will, for the sake of brevity, conside
of such organizations. In many societies it is regarded
that a man should marry the daughter of his mother
is a form of the custom known as cross-cousin mar
female cousins of this kind, or all those women whom by
tory system he classifies as such, are potential wives for h
brothers are his potential brothers-in-law. Amo
Indians of North America, the Chiga of Uganda, a
New Caledonia, as well as elsewhere, this form of marriage
is accompanied by a joking relationship between a man
and daughters of his mother's brother. To quote o
these, the following is recorded for the Ojibwa. 'When
meet they must try to embarrass one another. Th
another, making the most vulgar allegations, by their
well as ours. But being " kind" relations, no one can
Cross-cousins who do not joke in this way are consi
as not playing the social game.'"
The joking relationship here is of fundamentally th
that already discussed. It is established before marriag
tinued, after marriage, with the brothers- and sisters-in-l
Ruth Landes in Mead, Co-operation and Competition among P
1937, p. I03.
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS I99
In some parts of Africa there are joking relation
nothing to do with marriage. Mr. Pedler's note, m
refers to a joking relationship between two distinct t
and the Zaramu, and in the evidence it was stated
similar relation between the Sukuma and the Zigua
Ngoni and the Bemba. The woman's evidence sug
custom of rough teasing exists in the Sukuma tribe
related by marriage, as it does in so many other Afr
While a joking relationship between two tribes is
and certainly deserves, as Mr. Pedler suggests, to
vestigated, a similar relationship between clans has
other parts of Africa. It is described by Profess
Mademoiselle Paulme in the articles previously m
amongst the Tallensi it has been studied by Dr. Fort
with it in a forthcoming publication.
The two clans are not, in these instances, special
intermarriage. The relation between them is an allian
friendliness and mutual aid combined with an appear
The general structural situation in these instances
follows. The individual is a member of a certain
clan, for example, within which his relations to othe
a complex set of rights and duties, referring to all
of social life, and supported by definite sanction
another group outside his own which is so linked wit
field of extension of jural and moral relations of the sam
Thus, in East Africa, as we learn from Mr. Pedler's
and the Zaramu do not joke with one another bec
I Incidentally it may be said that it was hardly satisfactory fo
establish a precedent whereby the man, who was observing w
and may even have been an obligatory custom, was declared
assault, even with extenuating circumstances. It seems quite p
may have committed a breach of etiquette in teasing the woma
her mother's brother, for in many parts of the world it is rega
two persons in a joking relationship to tease one another
obscenity is involved) in the presence of certain relatives of e
the breach of etiquette would still not make it an assault. A li
anthropology would have enabled the magistrate, by putt
questions to the witnesses, to have obtained a fuller understand
all that was involved in it.
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zoo ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
bond exists between them since they are ndug
the field within which social relations are thus defined there lie other
groups with which, since they are outsiders to the individual's own
group, the relation involves possible or actual hostility. In any fixed
relations between the members of two such groups the separateness of
the groups must be recognized. It is precisely this separateness which
is not merely recognized but emphasized when a joking relationship
is established. The show of hostility, the perpetual disrespect, is a
continual expression of that social disjunction which is an essential
part of the whole structural situation, but over which, without
destroying or even weakening it, there is provided the social conjunction
of friendliness and mutual aid.
The theory that is here put forward, therefore, is that both the
joking relationship which constitutes an alliance between clans or
tribes, and that between relatives by marriage, are modes of organizing
a definite and stable system of social behaviour in which conjunctive
and disjunctive components, as I have called them, are maintained
and combined.
To provide the full evidence for this theory by following out its
implications and examining in detail its application to different
instances would take a book rather than a short article. But some
confirmation can perhaps be offered by a consideration of the way in
which respect and disrespect appear in various kinship relations,
even though nothing more can be attempted than a very brief indication
of a few significant points.
In studying a kinship system it is possible to distinguish the different
relatives by reference to the kind and degree of respect that is paid to
them.' Although kinship systems vary very much in their details
there are certain principles which are found to be very widespread.
One of them is that by which a person is required to show a marked
respect to relatives belonging to the generation immediately preceding
his own. In a majority of societies the father is a relative to whom
marked respect must be shown. This is so even in many so-called
See, for example, the kinship systems described in Social Anthropology of North
American Tribes, edited by Fred Eggan, University of Chicago Press, i937; and
Margaret Mead, 'Kinship in the Admiralty Islands', Anthropological Papers of the
American Museum of Natural History, vol. xxxiv, pp. 243-56.
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 20I
matrilineal societies, i.e. those which are organized i
clans or lineages. One can very frequently observ
extend this attitude of respect to all relatives of th
generation and, further, to persons who are not r
those tribes of East Africa that are organized into a
required to show special respect to all men of his fat
to their wives.
The social function of this is obvious. The social tradition is handed
down from one generation to the next. For the tradition to be maintained
it must have authority behind it. The authority is therefore
normally recognized as possessed by members of the preceding
generation and it is they who exercise discipline. As a result of this
the relation between persons of the two generations usually contains
an element of inequality, the parents and those of their generation
being in a position of superiority over the children who are subordinate
to them. The unequal relation between a father and his son is maintained
by requiring the latter to show respect to the former. The
relation is asymmetrical.
When we turn to the relation of an individual to his grandparents
and their brothers and sisters we find that in the majority of human
societies relatives of the second ascending generation are treated with
very much less respect than those of the first ascending generation,
and instead of a marked inequality there is a tendency to approximate
to a friendly equality.
Considerations of space forbid any full discussion of this feature of
social structure, which is one of very great importance. There are
many instances in which the grandparents and their grandchildren are
grouped together in the social structure in opposition to their
children and parents. An important clue to the understanding of the
subject is the fact that in the flow of social life through time, in which
men are born, become mature, and die, the grandchildren replace
their grandparents.
In many societies there is an actual joking relationship, usually of
a relatively mild kind, between relatives of alternate generations.
Grandchildren make fun of their grandparents and of those who are
called grandfather and grandmother by the classificatory system of
terminology, and these reply in kind.
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202 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
Grandparents and grandchildren are united by kinsh
separated by age and by the social difference that results
that as the grandchildren are in process of entering int
tion in the social life of the community the grandparents
retiring from it. Important duties towards his relatives
even more in his parents' generation impose upon an in
restraints; but with those of the second ascending
grandparents and collateral relatives, there can be,
established a relationship of simple friendliness relati
restraint. In this instance also, it is suggested, the joki
is a method of ordering a relation which combines soc
and disjunction.
This thesis could, I believe, be strongly supported if
strated by considering the details of these relation
space for only one illustrative point. A very common
in this connexion is for the grandchild to pretend th
marry the grandfather's wife, or that he intends to d
grandfather dies, or to treat her as already being his
tively the grandfather may pretend that the wife of hi
or might be, his wife.I The point of the joke is the pre
ing the difference of age between the grandparent and
In various parts of the world there are societies in w
son teases and otherwise behaves disrespectfully toward
brother. In these instances the joking relationship see
to be asymmetrical. For example the nephew may t
property but not vice versa; or, as amongst the Nama H
nephew may take a fine beast from his uncle's herd a
return takes a wretched beast from that of the nephew
The kind of social structure in which this custom of
respect to the mother's brother occurs in its most mar
example the Thonga of south-east Africa, Fiji and
Pacific, and the Central Siouan tribes of North Ameri
terized by emphasis on patrilineal lineage and a marke
For examples see Labouret, Les Tribus du Rameau Lobi, 193 , p
Chandra Roy, The Oraons of Chota Nagpur, Ranchi, 1915, pp. 352
2 A. Winifred Hoernle,' Social Organization of the Nama Hotten
Anthropologist, N.S., vol. xxvii, 9I925, pp. 1-24.
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 203
between relatives through the father and relatives th
mother.
In a former publicationI I offered an interpretation of t
of privileged familiarity towards the mother's brother. B
as follows. For the continuance of a social system childre
be cared for and to be trained. Their care demands affec
unselfish devotion; their training requires that they shall
to discipline. In the societies with which we are concerne
something of a division of function between the parents
relatives on the two sides. The control and discipline a
chiefly by the father and his brothers and generally also by h
these are relatives who must be respected and obeyed
mother who is primarily responsible for the affectionat
mother and her brothers and sisters are therefore relati
be looked to for assistance and indulgence. The mother's
called 'male mother' in Tonga and in some South Afric
I believe that this interpretation of the special posit
mother's brother in these societies has been confirmed by fur
work since I wrote the article referred to. But I was quit
the time it was written that the discussion and interpreta
to be supplemented so as to bring them into line with a ge
of the social functions of respect and disrespect.
The joking relationship with the mother's brother seem
with the general theory of such relationships here o
person's most important duties and rights attach him to
relatives, living and dead. It is to his patrilineal lineage o
he belongs. For the members of his mother's lineage h
sider, though one in whom they have a very special
interest. Thus here again there is a relation in which the
attachment, or conjunction, and separation, or disjunction,
two persons concerned.
But let us remember that in this instance the relation is asy
'The Mother's Brother in South Africa', South African Journ
vol. xxi, 1924.
2 There are some societies in which the relation between a mother's
a sister's son is approximately symmetrical, and therefore one of e
seems to be so in the Western Islands of Torres Straits, but we have
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204 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
The nephew is disrespectful, and the uncle accepts
There is inequality and the nephew is the superior. Thi
by the natives themselves. Thus in Tonga it is said th
son is a ' chief' (eiki) to his mother's brother, and J
Thonga native as saying 'The uterine nephew is a c
any liberty he likes with his maternal uncle.' Thus th
tionship with the uncle does not merely annul the
between the two generations, it reverses it. But while
of the father and the father's sister is exhibited in the
shown to them, the nephew's superiority to his mother
the opposite form of permitted disrespect.
It has been mentioned that there is a widespread ten
that a man should show respect towards, and treat as s
his relatives in the generation preceding his own, and
joking with, and at the expense of, the maternal uncle c
with this tendency. This conflict between principles of
us to understand what seems at first sight a very extraord
of the kinship terminology of the Thonga tribe and th
in south-east Africa. Amongst the Thonga, although t
malume (== male mother) for the mother's brother, this r
and perhaps more frequently, referred to as a grandfa
and he refers to his sister's son as his grandchild (ntu
VaNdau tribe the mother's brother and also the mother's brother's
son are called 'grandfather' (tetekulu, literally 'great father') and
their wives are called 'grandmother' (mbiya), while the sister's son
and the father's sister's son are called ' grandchild' (imuzkulu).
This apparently fantastic way of classifying relatives can be interpreted
as a sort of legal fiction whereby the male relatives of the
mother's lineage are grouped together as all standing towards an
individual in the same general relation. Since this relation is one of
privileged familiarity on the one side, and solicitude and indulgence on
the other, it is conceived as being basically the one appropriate for a
grandchild and a grandfather. This is indeed in the majority of human
societies the relationship in which this pattern of behaviour most
as to any teasing or joking, though it is said that each of the two relatives may take
the property of the other.
I Life of a South African Tribe, vol. i, p. 255.
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 205
frequently occurs. By this legal fiction the mother's b
belong to the first ascending generation, of which it
members ought to be respected.
It may be worth while to justify this interpretation
another of the legal fictions of the VaNdau terminolo
south-eastern Bantu tribes both the father's sister
particularly the elder sister, are persons who must be
great respect. They are also both of them members of
patrilineal lineage. Amongst the Va Ndau the father's
'female father' (tetadji) and so also is the sister.I Thus
of terminological classification the sister is placed
generation, the one that appropriately includes person
must exhibit marked respect.
In the south-eastern Bantu tribes there is assimilation of two kinds
of joking relatives, the grandfather and the mother's brother. It may
help our understanding of this to consider an example in which the
grandfather and the brother-in-law are similarly grouped together.
The Cherokee Indians of North America, probably numbering at one
time about 20,000, were divided into seven matrilineal clans.2 A man
could not marry a woman of his own clan or of his father's clan.
Common membership of the same clan connects him with his brothers
and his mother's brothers. Towards his father and all his relatives in
his father's clan of his own or his father's generation he is required by
custom to show a marked respect. He applies the kinship term for
' father ' not only to his father's brothers but also to the sons of his
father's sisters. Here is another example of the same kind of fiction as
described above; the relatives of his own generation whom he is
required to respect and who belong to his father's matrilineal lineage
are spoken of as though they belonged to the generation of his
parents. The body of his immediate kindred is included in these two
clans, that of his mother and his father. To the other clans of the
tribe he is in a sense an outsider. But with two of them he is connected,
namely with the clans of his two grandfathers, his father's
For the kinship terminology of the VaNdau see Boas, ' Das Verwandtschaftssystem
der Vandau ', in Zeitschriftfiir Ethnologie, 1922, pp. 4I-5 .
2 For an account of the Cherokee see Gilbert, in Social Anthropology of North
American Tribes, pp. 285-338.
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206 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
father and his mother's father. He speaks of all the me
two clans, of whatever age, as 'grandfathers' and 'g
He stands in a joking relationship with all of them
marries he must respect his wife's parents but jokes wit
and sisters.
The interesting and critical feature is that it is regard
larly appropriate that a man should marry a woman w
'grandmother', i.e. a member of his father's fathe
mother's father's clan. If this happens his wife's broth
whom he continues to tease, are amongst those whom
teased as his 'grandfathers' and 'grandmothers '. Th
to the widely spread organization in which a man has
tionship with the children of his mother's brother and
marry one of the daughters.
It ought perhaps to be mentioned that the Cherok
one-sided joking relationship in which a man tease
sister's husband. The same custom is found in Mota of the Bank
Islands. In both instances we have a society organized on a matrilineal
basis in which the mother's brother is respected, the father's
sister's son is called ' father' (so that the father's sister's husband is
the father of a 'father'), and there is a special term for the father's
sister's husband. Further observation of the societies in which this
custom occurs is required before we can be sure of its interpretation.
I do not remember that it has been reported from any part of Africa.
What has been attempted in this paper is to define in the most
general and abstract terms the kind of structural situation in which
we may expect to find well-marked joking relationships. We have
been dealing with societies in which the basic social structure is provided
by kinship. By reason of his birth or adoption into a certain
position in the social structure an individual is connected with a large
number of other persons. With some of them he finds himself in a
definite and specific jural relation, i.e. one which can be defined in
terms of rights and duties. Who these persons will be and what will
be the rights and duties depend on the form taken by the social
structure. As an example of such a specific jural relation we may take
that which normally exists between a father and son, or an elder
brother and a younger brother. Relations of the same general type
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 207
may be extended over a considerable range to all the
lineage or a clan or an age-set. Besides these specific
which are defined not only negatively but also positive
of things that must be done as well as things that mus
general jural relations which are expressed almost enti
prohibitions and which extend throughout the whole p
It is forbidden to kill or wound other persons or to t
their property. Besides these two classes of social rela
another, including many very diverse varieties, which
called relations of alliance or consociation. For exam
form of alliance of very great importance in many soc
two persons or two groups are connected by an excha
services.' Another example is provided by the institut
brotherhood which is so widespread in Africa.
The argument of this paper has been intended to
joking relationship is one special form of alliance in
alliance by exchange of goods or services may be as
joking relationship, as in the instance recorded by
bouret.2 Or it may be combined with the custom
Thus in the Andaman Islands the parents of a man and
his wife avoid all contact with each other and do not sp
time it is the custom that they should frequently exc
through the medium of the younger married couple. Bu
of gifts may also exist without either joking or avoidan
in the exchange of gifts between the family of a man and
the woman he marries or the very similar exchange b
and his 'talking chief'.
So also in an alliance by blood-brotherhood there ma
relationship as amongst the Zande;3 and in the som
alliance formed by exchange of names there may
teasing. But in alliances of this kind there may be
extreme respect and even of avoidance. Thus in th
See Mauss, ' Essai sur le Don', Annee Sociologique, Nouvell
pp. 3o-I86.
2 Africa, vol. ii, p. 245.
3 Evans-Pritchard,' Zande Blood-brotherhood ', Africa, vol. v
40I.
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208 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
neighbouring tribes of South Australia two boys belo
munities distant from one another, and therefore mor
are brought into an alliance by the exchange of th
umbilical cords. The relationship thus established
the two boys may never speak to one another. But w
up they enter upon a regular exchange of gifts, whi
machinery for a sort of commerce between the two g
they belong.
Thus the four modes of alliance or consociation, (i)
marriage, (2) by exchange of goods or services, (3) by
hood or exchange of names or sacra, and (4) by the jok
may exist separately or combined in several different
parative study of these combinations presents a numb
but complex problems. The facts recorded from W
Professor Labouret and Mademoiselle Paulme afford us valuable
material. But a good deal more intensive field research is needed
before these problems of social structure can be satisfactorily dealt
with.
What I have called relations by alliance need to be compared with
true contractual relations. The latter are specific jural relations
entered into by two persons or two groups, in which either party has
definite positive obligations towards the other, and failure to carry
out the obligations is subject to a legal sanction. In an alliance by
blood-brotherhood there are general obligations of mutual aid, and
the sanction for the carrying out of these, as shown by Dr. EvansPritchard,
is of a kind that can be called magical or ritual. In the
alliance by exchange of gifts failure to fulfil the obligation to make an
equivalent return for a gift received breaks the alliance and substitutes
a state of hostility and may also cause a loss of prestige for the defaulting
party. Professor MaussI has argued that in this kind of alliance
also there is a magical sanction, but it is very doubtful if such is always
present, and even when it is it may often be of secondary importance.
The joking relationship is in some ways the exact opposite of a
contractual relation. Instead of specific duties to be fulfilled there is
privileged disrespect and freedom or even licence, and the only obligation
is not to take offence at the disrespect so long as it is kept within
I Essai sur le Don '.
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ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS 209
certain bounds defined by custom, and not to go beyon
Any default in the relationship is like a breach of the
quette; the person concerned is regarded as not kn
behave himself.
In a true contractual relationship the two parties are
a definite common interest in reference to which each of them
accepts specific obligations. It makes no difference that in other
matters their interests may be divergent. In the joking relationship
and in some avoidance relationships, such as that between a man
and his wife's mother, one basic determinant is that the social structure
separates them in such a way as to make many of their interests
divergent, so that conflict or hostility might result. The alliance by
extreme respect, by partial or complete avoidance, prevents such
conflict but keeps the parties conjoined. The alliance by joking does
the same thing in a different way.
All that has been, or could be, attempted in this paper is to show the
place of the joking relationship in a general comparative study of
social structure. What I have called, provisionally, relations of consociation
or alliance are distinguished from the relations set up by
common membership of a political society which are defined in terms
of general obligations, of etiquette, or morals, or of law. They are
distinguished also from true contractual relations, defined by some
specific obligation for each contracting party, into which the individual
enters of his own volition. They are further to be distinguished from
the relations set up by common membership of a domestic group, a
lineage or a clan, each of which has to be defined in terms of a whole
set of socially recognized rights and duties. Relations of consociation
can only exist between individuals or groups which are in some way
socially separated.
This paper deals only with formalized or standardized joking relations.
Teasing or making fun of other persons is of course a common
mode of behaviour in any human society. It tends to occur in certain
kinds of social situations. Thus I have observed in certain classes in
English-speaking countries the occurrence of horse-play between
young men and women as a preliminary to courtship, very similar
to the way in which a Cherokee Indian jokes with his 'grandmothers'.
Certainly these unformalized modes of behaviour need to be studied
p
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210 ON JOKING RELATIONSHIPS
by the sociologist. For the purpose of this paper i
that teasing is always a compound of friendline
The scientific explanation of the institution in the
which it occurs in a given society can only be re
study which enables us to see it as a particular ex
phenomenon of a definite class. This means t
structure has to be thoroughly examined in orde
form and incidence of joking relationships can
of a consistent system. It if be asked why that socie
that it does have, the only possible answer woul
When the history is unrecorded, as it is for the
Africa, we can only indulge in conjecture, and
neither scientific nor historical knowledge.I
A. R. RADCLIFFE-BROWN.
Resume
LA PARENTE2 A PLAISANTERIES
ON constate chez plusieurs tribus africaines l'existence des rapports sociaux
coutumiers tels que les interesses ont le droit, et meme le devoir, de s'injurier.
Ce sont les parentes ou les alliances a plaisanteries. Le but de cette article est
d'indiquer les conditions generales dans lesquelles ces usages se trouvent. C'est
quand la structure sociale est telle qu'entre deux personnes il y a a la fois liaison
et separation que l'on trouve ou des relations de respect exagere et de pudeur,
ou leurs contraires, des relations de sans-gene ou d'irrespect, de raillerie ou
de badinage grossier, voire meme obscene. Ce sont deux moyens alternatifs
d'etablir une alliance qui peut s'appeler extra-juridique.
The general theory outlined in this paper is one that I have presented in
lectures at various universities since 1909 as part of the general study of the forms
of social structure. In arriving at the present formulation of it I have been helped
by discussions with Dr. Meyer Fortes.
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