The Importance of Not Being Earnest

Perhaps the most ingratiating aspect of the book is Chafe's personable writing style and his open-minded attitude toward his topic and materials, indeed toward the whole enterprise of linguistics and scientific inquiry.

The book brings to fruition reflections concerning the important place of laughter in human communication which have clearly been incubating in Chafe's thought since the 1970s. There are several reasons to be grateful for so long a gestation. It may well have been necessary to achieve the book's bright clarity of thought in a field which remains somewhat inchoate. Further, although the book is packed with intelligent and probing discussion, it is easy to read and deceptively short (at 167 pages), but still long enough to allow Chafe to integrate perspectives from the wide-ranging individual studies he has previously published, dealing with verbal punning, laughter, and also the ontological purposes of the behaviours we associate with humour and laughter, where he probed their evolutionary rationale in a Lorenzian fashion.[1] Lastly, the long wait has allowed the author, after his retirement (from University of California system, both at Berkeley and Santa Barbara) but from a newly liberated position as both Emeritus and Research Professor, to incorporate his most recent interests in consciousness, emotion and communication, and the phonetics of laughter.

The resulting volume is a delight to read and could only have been offered by a scholar who is willing, confidently but respectfully, to cross many disciplinary boundaries. There is no doubt it will be a stimulus to further research and debate.