The discourse about laughter that has now become traditional, seems to summon to mind three principal characteristics of laughter: its specifically human nature; its structural relationship to the joy and pleasure procured by what is laughable; " its automatic, reflexive aspect. Furthermore, numerous scholars have expressed ideas, certain ones of which have been structured into explanatory theories claiming general applicability. These two types of discourse seem unsatisfactory to me. The first one seems to obscure two fundamental aspects of laughter: its historicity and the complexity of its...