735

LEARNING TO LAUGH AT OURSELVES: HUMOR,

SELF-TRANSCENDENCE, AND THE CULTIVATION
OF MORAL VIRTUES
Mordechai Gordon
School of Education
Quinnipiac University

Abstract. In this essay Mordechai Gordon begins to address the neglect of humor among philosophers
of education by focusing on some interesting connections between humor, self-transcendence, and the
development of moral virtues. More specifically, he explores the kind of humor that makes fun of
oneself and how it can affect educational encounters. Gordon begins his analysis by discussing the
nature and purpose of humor in general, while distinguishing it from laughter and amusement. In the
next part of the essay, he takes a close look at the characteristics and benefits of the type of humor that
we use when we make fun of ourselves. He then turns his attention to exploring the relation between
laughing at ourselves, self-transcendence, and a number of moral virtues. The final part of this essay
briefly examines what might happen to the quality of educational encounters when teachers become
more comfortable with laughing at themselves.

Introduction
Throughout the history of Western philosophy, relatively little has been writ-
ten about humor, laughter, and amusement. While many philosophers, including
Plato and Aristotle, touched on humor in their writings, they generally did not
address this topic in depth or attempt to create a general theory of humor. Writing
in the 1980s, humor theorist John Morreall noted that ‘‘until a few years ago,
the study of laughter was treated in academic circles as frivolous.’’1 Morreall
attributed this neglect to the misguided belief that since laughter is not a seri-
ous activity, it is neither possible nor desirable to investigate this phenomenon
seriously. Moreover, since laughing has rarely been considered a capacity that is
uniquely human, it never received the kind of attention and serious investigation
that was dedicated to thinking, speaking, or acting.
Aside from a general tendency to neglect humor, Morreall suggests in his
new book Comic Relief that throughout most of the history of Western philos-
ophy, the assessment of humor has not been kind.2 Indeed, not only Plato and
Aristotle but also René Descartes and Thomas Hobbes generally viewed humor
with scorn and tended to focus on the negative rather than the positive aspects
of humor. Many philosophers from Plato to Hobbes subscribed to what is called
the superiority theory, which considered laughter as an expression of our delight
in the shortcomings of others. Two other theories that have attempted to explain
laughter and humor are the incongruity and the relief theories. Briefly, the former
suggests that laughter arises when we perceive something as incongruous (for

1. John Morreall, Taking Laughter Seriously (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1983), ix.
2. See John Morreall, Comic Relief: A Comprehensive Philosophy of Humor (Oxford: Wiley-
Blackwell, 2009).

EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

© 2011 Board of Trustees University of Illinois
736 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

example, Immanuel Kant and Arthur Schopenhauer expressed this view); whereas
the latter maintains that laughter functions to release nervous energy (Herbert
Spencer and Sigmund Freud held this position).3 Despite the attempts of various
modern philosophers and theorists to deal with humor, Morreall claims that it
was not until well into the twentieth century that humor gained even a semblance
of respect among philosophers and thinkers in general.
The general tendency among philosophers to overlook or marginalize humor is
probably even more prevalent when one examines the relation between philosophy
of education and humor. In fact, my preliminary research of this topic suggests
that very few articles in philosophy of education journals have been published in
the last couple of decades that even mention humor, let alone attempt to explore
this topic in adequate depth. Two notable exceptions that at least refer to humor
or jest are Cris Mayo’s essay ‘‘Being in on the Joke: Pedagogy, Race, Humor,’’ and
Jim Garrison’s article ‘‘Teacher as Prophetic Trickster.’’4 Yet these rare exceptions
only serve to illustrate the point that educational theorists have yet to take a
serious look at some of the relations between philosophy of education and humor.
This essay is intended to begin to address the neglect of humor among philoso-
phers of education by focusing on some interesting connections between humor,
self-transcendence, and the development of moral virtues. More specifically, I
would like to explore the kind of humor that makes fun of oneself and how it can
affect educational encounters. I begin my analysis by discussing the nature and
purpose of humor in general, while distinguishing it from laughter and amuse-
ment. In the next part of the essay, I take a close look at the characteristics and
benefits of the type of humor that we use when we make fun of ourselves. I
then turn my attention to exploring the relation between laughing at ourselves,
self-transcendence, and a number of moral virtues. In the final part of this essay, I
briefly examine what might happen to the quality of educational encounters when
teachers become more comfortable with laughing at themselves.

The Nature and Purpose of Humor

In The Will to Power, Friedrich Nietzsche sarcastically remarked that ‘‘perhaps
I know best why man alone laughs: he alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent
laughter. The unhappiest and most melancholy animal is, as fitting, the most

3. This essay is not aimed at addressing in depth the three classical humor theories as many other
writers have already done. For a good analysis of these three theories, including examples of each one,
see John Morreall, ed., The Philosophy of Laughter and Humor (Albany: State University of New York
Press, 1987).
4. Cris Mayo, ‘‘Being in on the Joke: Pedagogy, Race, Humor,’’ Philosophy of Education 2008, ed. Ronald
David Glass (Urbana, Illinois: Philosophy of Education Society, 2009), 244–252; and Jim Garrison,
‘‘Teacher as Prophetic Trickster,’’ Educational Theory 59, no. 1 (2009): 67–83.

MORDECHAI GORDON is Professor in the School of Education at Quinnipiac University, 275 Mount
Carmel Ave., Hamden, CT 06518; e-mail: <mordechai.gordon@quinnipiac.edu>. His primary areas of
scholarship are philosophy of education, humor, and teacher education.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 737

cheerful.’’5 Although we cannot know for sure that other animals do not laugh
like us, it is a pretty safe bet to say that humans are the only beings that are
aware of themselves laughing, much as they are the only ones who know that
they suffer. Another way of making Nietzsche’s point is to say that we are the
only beings who have a sense of humor and are conscious of having this capacity.
Our sense of humor enables us to laugh not only at other people, situations, and
funny incidents that we read about or watch, but also to laugh at ourselves. Humor
allows us to view the world from a perspective that is amusing and comical rather
than serious or sad.
In order to avoid confusions and conceptual errors, I would like briefly to
distinguish humor from both laughter and amusement. To begin with, it is inter-
esting to note that unlike laughter, both humor and amusement are relatively new
terms that acquired their current meanings only in the late seventeenth century.
The word laughter, on the other hand, can be traced back thousands of years, not
only to Western societies such as ancient Greece but to Eastern cultures as well.
‘‘It denotes a combination of bodily events, including the spasmodic expulsion of
air from the lungs, accompanying sounds, characteristic facial distortions, and in
heavy laughter the shaking of the whole body.’’6 Following Morreall’s analysis, I
am using the word laughter to refer to the physical activity that is caused by and
expresses the feelings of a pleasant psychological shift. Laughter can be produced
by a wide range of activities, from tickling to hearing a joke, and from regaining
safety after being in danger to watching other people experience misfortune.
Amusement, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), is ‘‘the plea-
surable occupation of the attention, or diversion of the mind’’ from serious duties.
To amuse means to divert the attention of someone from serious business by any-
thing trifling, ludicrous, entertaining, light, or cheerful. When people are amused,
they often laugh or smile with pleasure. Amusement, therefore, is the pleasant
feeling produced by a diversion of our attention or a psychological shift. It is
important to note that while amusement usually manifests in laughter or smiling,
the state of being amused is not necessarily the result of humor. People may be
amused by many things that are nonhumorous, such as driving along a scenic
road, playing a sport, or reading an exhilarating novel.
Finally, humor refers to ‘‘that quality of action, speech or writing, which
excites amusement’’ (OED) and often results in laughter. Our sense of humor
is that capacity that enables us to identify ironical, cynical, sarcastic, witty,
ludicrous, and generally funny expressions, comments, or actions. Humor is used
here in the broad sense of the term to signify a variety of activities, from self-
deprecating and wry remarks to absurd and hilarious deeds. It can manifest in many
different ways, including jokes, puns, funny facial expressions, imitating others,
spontaneous comments that amuse people, and so forth. However, as mentioned

5. See Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Will to Power, trans. Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale (New York:
Vintage Books, 1967), 56.
6. Morreall, ed., The Philosophy of Laughter and Humor, 4.
738 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

previously, there are many cases of amusement, such as singing and dancing, that
are not humorous and do not result in laughter. There are also many cases in which
people laugh that are not really humorous (for example, tickling, running into an
old friend on the street, or feeling embarrassed). Thus, although I am using humor
here in the broad sense, it is a narrower term than both laughter and amusement.
Despite the important distinctions between humor, laughter, and amusement,
the three terms are closely connected. For instance, we frequently laugh when we
are amused or when we detect somebody using humor. Being amused can be the
result of both laughter and humor, while this state can also lead to more fun, laugh-
ter, and jest. Humor usually amuses people who are exposed to it and produces
laughter. Hence, there is a mutual interaction among humor, laughter, and amuse-
ment, in the sense that each affects the other two and is in turn influenced by them.
Rather than focusing on one of the traditional theories of humor, or arguing
for a general theory of humor that would attempt to explain what makes people
laugh in all situations, I advocate an eclectic view of humor. Sometimes we laugh
at jokes or comments that point out the shortcomings of others and make us feel
superior to them. On many occasions we laugh when we discover an incongruity
or a discrepancy between our expectations that something will follow a certain
pattern and our actual perceptions of this reality. For instance, if our doorbell
rings, we expect to open the door and find a person there; however, if we were to
open the door and find a dog or a cat standing there, this would be funny. Still,
on other occasions we laugh simply when we are being playful with friends or
family or making witty remarks to others. Donald Hanks echoes the point that
it is virtually impossible to construct a general theory that would cover all the
different instances of humor when he writes that ‘‘humor wells kaleidoscopically
from unseen depths, forever bursting into novel instantiations, and will therefore
resist the formulation of any general theory that seeks to integrate it with the
other causes of laughter by isolating a single thread.’’7
It is important to emphasize, as Morreall does, that humor is fundamentally
a social experience.8 For one, we laugh much more when we are surrounded by
other people than when we are alone. Indeed, laughter is contagious and it has
even been proven to work as a form of therapy for people who are depressed or just
feel sad. Jokes are meant to be shared with others, and comedians know that when
the audience is not being amused, the humor is probably not very funny. Above
all, humor can greatly reduce the tension among people and enable individuals
who are different from each other to get along and even live together in harmony.
In his famous essay titled In Praise of Folly, Desiderius Erasmus eloquently
captured the social value of humor and silliness. Written in 1509, this essay is a
long speech made by the goddess Folly on her own behalf in which she argues that

7. Donald Hanks, ‘‘Self-Deprecating Humor in Relation to Laughter,’’ Contemporary Philosophy 23, no.
5–6 (2001): 32.
8. Morreall, Comic Relief, 59.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 739

it is foolishness rather than reason that makes possible everything we value most
in life:
In sum, no society, no union in life, could be either pleasant or lasting without me [Folly]. A
people does not for long tolerate its prince, or a master tolerate his servant, a handmaiden her
mistress, a teacher his student, a friend his friend, a wife her husband, a landlord his tenant,
a partner his partner, or a boarder his fellow boarder, except as they mutually or by turns
are mistaken, on occasion flatter, on occasion wisely wink, and otherwise soothe themselves
with the sweetness of folly.9

Erasmus’s point is that in order to have harmonious relations with our colleagues,
family members, or friends, we need to be able to overlook some of their blemishes
and laugh when they make mistakes. It is folly and our sense of humor, no less
than reason, that enable us to live together with others, form close relationships
with them, and even love one another. Yet, as I will argue in the next section, it is
easier to tolerate the flaws and imperfections of others when we are able to laugh
at our own.

Laughing at Ourselves
Historically speaking, it was not only Western philosophy that tended to treat
humor with suspicion and scorn. Christianity was also very vocal in its insistence
that sternness and discipline were those qualities that Christians needed to adopt,
while associating laughter and humor with the loss of self-control and the breaking
of social rules. For instance, John Chrysostom, an early Christian thinker, wrote
that
Laughter often gives birth to foul discourse, and foul discourse to actions still more foul. Often
from words and laughter proceed railing and insult; and from railing and insult, blows and
wounds; and from blows and wounds, slaughter and murder.10

In this view, laughter is bad because it can lead to uncontrollable behavior,

aggression, and even violence. Other thinkers from the monastic tradition and
the Puritans were also very critical of laughter and humor and argued that they
were incompatible with the good Christian life based on moderation of speech and
action.
Given Nietzsche’s sharp attacks against both Western philosophy and
Christianity, it is not surprising to find that he also denounced their negative
attitude toward laughter and humor. Indeed, in the chapter called ‘‘On the Higher
Man’’ in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, he mocked those who believe that laughing is
our greatest sin on earth. Summarizing the value of the laughing spirit against the
dead weight of our culture and traditions, Nietzsche wrote,
What gives asses wings, what milks lionesses — praised be this good intractable spirit that
comes like a cyclone to all today and to all the mob. What is averse to thistle-heads and

9. Desiderius Erasmus, In Praise of Folly, trans. Hoyt Hopewell Hudson (Princeton, New Jersey:
Princeton University Press, 1941), 28.
10. John Chrysostom, ‘‘On the Priesthood: Ascetic Treatises; Select Homilies and Letters; Homilies on
the Statues,’’ vol. 9 of A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church,
ed. Philip Schaff (New York: Christian Literature, 1889), 442.
740 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

casuists’ heads and to all the wilted leaves and weeds — praised be this wild, good, free storm
spirit that dances on swamps and on melancholy as on meadows. What hates the mob’s
blether-cocks and all the bungled gloomy brood — praised be this spirit of all free spirits, the
laughing gale that blows dust into the eyes of all the black-sighted, sore-blighted.11

For Nietzsche, the way to become liberated from the melancholy teachings
and the gloomy morality of various religions is not by anger but by relying on a
spirit of jest and lightheartedness. Throughout this chapter, Nietzsche repeated
that failure is good and called on the higher human beings to ‘‘learn to laugh at
yourselves as one must laugh!’’ By learning to laugh at ourselves and accept failure
as an integral part of the human condition, we also begin to question the Spirit
of Gravity — those morals that have been handed down to us by tradition, which
we typically take for granted. Nietzsche recognized better than most philosophers
that part of what makes our lives so burdensome and gloomy is our uncritical
attachment to various conventions that we inherited from our parents, culture, or
religion. Taking ourselves less seriously can help us relate to these conventions
less rigidly and perhaps even become open to the possibility of creating new values.
Not taking ourselves so seriously also has some psychological benefits, as
Sigmund Freud recognized. In his essay ‘‘Humor,’’ Freud distinguished between
the superego that normally lacerates the ego and a nonhostile superego that seeks
to console the ego. The latter situation is one that Freud associated with humor,
noting that, in humor, the superego ‘‘speaks such kindly words to comfort the
intimidated ego.’’12 Simon Critchley argues that Freud interpreted humor as a
maturation of the superego, ‘‘a maturity that comes from learning to laugh at one-
self, from finding oneself ridiculous.’’13 Critchley goes on to explain that humor
helps the superego become a less severe master; it enables this function of our
psyche to develop into a more gentle and flexible monitor. Humor, for Freud, is
very beneficial in that it promotes the development of a healthy relation between
the superego and the ego, one that is based more on comforting and supporting
than on scolding. Conversely, people who suffer from mental illnesses such as
depression and paranoia (having a very stern superego) are typically not able to
recognize and appreciate humor.
In addition to the insights of Nietzsche and Freud, some of the most important
lessons on the benefits of laughing at ourselves come to us from Zen Buddhism.
The Zen tradition that follows the ninth-century master Rinzai teaches us that in
order to reach enlightenment (satori) we need to liberate ourselves from attach-
ment. The kind of attachment that the Zen masters have in mind is not merely our
attachment to material things; they also want us to renounce our blind reverence
for religion as creed or a set of rituals to follow: ‘‘And so in Zen there are no
rituals, scripture, doctrines, or sacred figures — not even the Buddha — to whom

11. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, part 4 of The Portable Nietzsche, trans. Walter
Kaufmann (New York: Penguin Books, 1968), 407.
12. Sigmund Freud, ‘‘Humor,’’ in Art and Literature (London: Penguin Books, 1985), 433.
13. Simon Critchley, On Humor (New York: Routledge, 2002), 103.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 741

the followers should become attached.’’14 Moreover, Zen masters challenge the
dominant Western way of understanding the world through words, concepts, logic,
and rational thinking because they believe that it has led us to try to conquer
and control the world. In this view, we must continually question our conceptual
systems and remind ourselves that they are merely lenses and tools that only
provide us an incomplete view of reality.
Yet perhaps the most important kind of liberation that Zen masters advocate
is the emancipation from our attachment to the mind as a detached, metaphysical
entity. As Morreall writes,
In Zen the empirical ego is not the person and is not the independent substance. The
enlightenment sought is an intuitive awareness of the nothingness of the separate ‘‘mind’’ I
normally think of as my self. In being liberated from that mistaken attachment to the self, I
overcome the core of the problem of all attachment.15

Thus, in Zen, the most basic attachment that we need to break is our belief in a
detached, disembodied ‘‘I’’ that has an enduring and separate existence from the
rest of reality.
The benefit of our liberation from the notion of a detached self is that it
makes it much easier for us to laugh at ourselves. Once we begin to question the
notion of an independent ego — the empirical self that constitutes the core of our
being — we are likely to stop taking this ‘‘self’’ so seriously. Such realization may
lead one to be amused by the illusory nature of the self and to regard oneself as
a big joke and human existence as absurd. That is, once we are freed from our
uncritical attachment to our egos and can regard ourselves with humor, it is easier
for us to laugh at the other absurdities and incongruities that we experience.16
In his essay ‘‘The Absurd,’’ Thomas Nagel echoes this notion that the absurdity
inherent in human existence should be cause for humor not agony. Nagel first
acknowledges that people encounter daily many absurd situations when there is
a discrepancy between their pretensions or aspirations and reality. In those cases,
people generally try to modify the absurd situation by changing their aspirations,
by trying to align their reality with them, or by removing themselves entirely from
the situation. However, Nagel points out that a philosophical sense of absurdity
arises from the view that pretension and reality inevitably clash for everybody.
He accounts for this universal notion of absurdity by ‘‘the collision between
the seriousness with which we take our lives and the perceptual possibility of
regarding everything about which we are serious as arbitrary, or open to doubt.’’17
The problem is that neither the seriousness with which we approach our lives nor
the arbitrariness of our beliefs and conventions ever really change even when we

14. Morreall, Comic Relief, 134.

15. Ibid., 135.
16. Slavoj Žižek has a knack for identifying many of the absurdities and incongruities that mark current
foreign policy. See, for example, his essay ‘‘Iraq’s False Promises,’’ Foreign Policy, no. 140 (Jan–Feb,
2004), 43–48.
17. Thomas Nagel, ‘‘The Absurd,’’ Journal of Philosophy 68, no. 20 (1971): 718.
742 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

notice that they clash. Ultimately, Nagel concludes that the defiance that some
existentialists such as Albert Camus adopted in response to the absurd nature of
our existence is not a particularly mature and healthy attitude. Rather he believes
that being aware of our own absurdity is one of the most human and interesting
things about us, a fact that calls for laughter, irony, and humor rather than gloom
or despair. Being able to laugh at ourselves, then, is beneficial because it is one of
the best ways of coping with the absurd nature of human existence.
It is important to emphasize that neither Nagel nor the other thinkers men-
tioned here believe that laughing at ourselves has to manifest in an actual physical
laughter. Rather, laughing at ourselves should be understood as a kind of metaphor
for not taking oneself too seriously and being more self-critical. As John Ohliger
argues, laughing at ourselves ‘‘can be seen as the mood where we’re conscious at
the same time of our importance and of our insignificance.’’18 To be sure, there
are situations in which we actually laugh at ourselves when we make a foolish
mistake or when others poke fun at us. However, there are also many instances
in which this kind of humor is displayed when people are in a cheerful frame of
mind and are amused by their own shortcomings. In either case, what is essential
is embracing the spirit of lightheartedness that Nietzsche advocated since it can
liberate us from the weight of tradition and, even more importantly, from our own
rigid and self-absorbed tendencies.

Laughing at Ourselves, Self-Transcendence, and Moral Virtues

In the previous section, I argued that laughing at ourselves is very beneficial
in that it promotes a critical attitude, helps us be more flexible and forgiving, and
enables us to better cope both with the ordinary incongruities we encounter and the
general absurdity of our human existence. Here, I would like to extend this argu-
ment by exploring the relation between laughing at ourselves, self-transcendence,
and a number of moral virtues. Following Joseph Beatty, I am using the term virtue
to suggest a practice, disposition, or set of habits, which is
held in esteem by a community or society, to whom it is thought to be in some sense beneficial;
its practice should involve some coefficient of difficulty, that is, something (temptations to
the contrary, certain emotions, actions, inclinations) must be resisted.19

Beatty’s point is that to qualify as a moral virtue, a practice not only has to be
well regarded and helpful to a community of people, but must also involve resisting
some temptations such as behaving in a dishonest, unjust, or corrupt manner.
Moreover, as Robert Roberts asserts, ‘‘a virtue is an achievement, something with
which you can be credited as having had some hand in the production of it.’’20
Roberts argues correctly that moral virtues are traits that people can develop and
possess only through participating in their formation (such as courage or patience);

18. John Ohliger, ‘‘Forum: You Shall Know the Truth and the Truth Shall Make You Laugh,’’ Journal of
Adult Education 19, no. 1 (1990): 32.
19. Joseph Beatty, ‘‘Good Listening,’’ Educational Theory 49, no. 3 (1999): 291.
20. Robert C. Roberts, ‘‘Humor and the Virtues,’’ Inquiry 31, no. 2 (1988): 142.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 743

they are not merely genetic dispositions or attributes that were produced entirely
through social conditioning. Thus, I am using the term moral virtue to refer to a
practice or trait that is shaped to a significant extent by the person displaying it.
Regarding the notion of self-transcendence, Roberts associates it with the
kind of person who can generally enjoy any satirical representation of oneself.
Roberts is correct in saying that ‘‘a person who lacks the ability to be amused
by his own follies has a kind of rigidity which prevents him from dissociating
himself from his traits.’’21 Such a person lacks a certain kind of self-transcendence,
namely, the ability to rise above personal concern, to view the world from multiple
perspectives, and to appreciate the standpoints of others. Conversely, people who
enjoy laughing at themselves are generally able to transcend their immediate,
self-absorbed situation, even when that state is uncomfortable. Self-transcendence
refers here to the capacity to adopt a position that is not egocentric, to be able to
look at oneself from the perspective of others and enjoy the amusement that this
broader view provides.
Roberts associates self-transcendence and the ability to laugh at oneself with
the moral virtue of ‘‘blithe humility,’’ a cheerful kind of humbleness. He explains
that
A sense of humor about oneself is a lack of defensiveness (in the Freudian sense) and thus a
kind of self-transparency, or openness to ‘‘seeing’’ painful truths about oneself. For there is
often something painful about seeing oneself as significantly incongruous, but the pleasure of
being amused at this incongruity may mitigate the pain and open the heart. And since one
can hardly expect to improve morally without acknowledging foibles, the truthfulness which
blithe humility entails is fundamental to any moral character.22

For Roberts, blithe humility involves the ability to look at oneself humorously, yet
honestly, without immediately becoming defensive, making excuses, or shutting
down. Since this kind of humility implies not only being open to acknowledging
mistakes but also being amused by one’s mistakes, there is a greater chance that
behavioral change and moral growth will occur (in comparison to a defensive
stance). Of course, laughing at one’s foibles can also constitute a kind of defen-
siveness, as when someone uses self-deprecating humor to defuse other people’s
criticism. Yet, unlike the person with blithe humility, the self-deprecator is gen-
erally merely performing a role and is not willing to scrutinize oneself critically
and truthfully.
Aside from humility, the ability to laugh at ourselves can help foster other
moral virtues such as open-mindedness, honesty, and patience. As mentioned
before, people who never regard their own mistakes as amusing tend to be rigid
and find it difficult to look at themselves from the perspectives of others. In
contrast, the capacity to laugh at ourselves involves a willingness to consider
ourselves silly or foolish; it implies an openness to evaluate some of our habitual
ways of thinking or acting in light of different and more innovative ways of being.

21. Ibid., 141.

22. Ibid., 142.
744 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

For instance, a friend of mine who has a great sense of humor but a terrible sense of
direction once got lost on her way to my house. When she finally arrived an hour
and a half late, instead of cursing or pouting, she showed me a sticker that she
recently bought that read, ‘‘I am not lost, I am just exploring!’’ The ability to laugh
at her tendency to get lost and not get defensive not only helped her appease a
potentially tense situation, but, more importantly, enabled her to interpret getting
lost as something positive (exploring) and to literally go along for the ride. Hence,
when we laugh at ourselves, we are more open to seeing new ways of making
sense of our lives and of the world around us.
Humor can also be beneficial in getting people to speak the truth and be more
honest with each other. Indeed, as Shakespeare’s comedies illustrate, the truth is
often communicated to us through the medium of the Fool, who uses silliness
and humor to convey the sobering message. Humor is a very effective way to
convey the truth because it permits frankness to be less threatening than a more
confrontational style of discourse (for example, Jon Stewart and Michael Moore).
As Sammy Basu argues, ‘‘comedy can make palatable what is otherwise hard to
swallow.’’23 Unlike the person who takes herself too seriously, someone who is
able to laugh at herself can more easily acknowledge the ‘‘painful truths about
oneself’’ that Roberts spoke about in the quote cited previously. Since the latter
does not equate herself with her foibles, it is much easier for her to dissociate
herself from a particular mistake and relate to it with humor.24 In short, humor
has the potential not only to help us communicate important truths to others but
also to be more honest with ourselves about our own problems.
Finally, the ability to be playful and laugh at ourselves is correlated to patience
as a moral virtue. Patience refers to the power to tolerate inconvenience, delays, or
suffering while staying calm and not complaining. Patience is usually considered
a moral virtue because it implies the willingness and ability to put up with the
misbehavior, faults, or limitations of other people while maintaining a good spirit.
People who are patient usually display forbearance and generosity toward others.
In contrast, Basu claims that ‘‘those who take offense and go on the offensive
when they encounter people (or practices) different from themselves (or their
own) cling to their identity too tightly, too fearfully, with too much gravity and
melancholy.’’25 Taking ourselves less seriously can help us avoid becoming easily
irritated at others by reminding us to look at the big picture rather than sticking to
our habitual ways of thinking, which are often too narrow and self-centered. For
example, like many drivers, I easily get annoyed and experience road rage when
I get into a traffic jam or perceive other drivers doing foolish things. Frequently,

23. Sammy Basu, ‘‘Dialogic Ethics and the Virtue of Humor,’’ Journal of Political Philosophy 7, no. 4
(1999): 391.
24. Of course, humor, as in the case of alcoholics, can also be used to evade dealing with the truth or
changing one’s bad behavior. However, in those cases, the people making fun of themselves generally
know the truth, but feel that they are incapable of change. Such humor tends to produce a reaction that
is simultaneously comical and sad rather than one that is purely funny.
25. Basu, ‘‘Dialogic Ethics and the Virtue of Humor,’’ 390.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 745

what helps me to cope better in these moments is the ability to recall a joke that
applies to the awkward situation, such as George Carlin’s witty observation: ‘‘Did
you ever notice on the highway that everybody going faster than you is a maniac,
and everyone going slower than you is a moron?’’26 Humor helps us tolerate these
ordinary inconveniences by diverting our attention from the relatively minor
‘‘miseries’’ we experience to other more pleasant thoughts. It also enables us keep
the trivial incidents in perspective so that we can focus our energies on the more
important matters in life.
To be perfectly clear, I am not claiming that the ability to laugh at ourselves
is a necessary condition for the development of the moral virtues discussed here.
Nor am I saying that people who do not have a sense of humor or are not able to
laugh at themselves cannot behave ethically toward others. Moreover, I am not
trying to suggest that the moral virtues mentioned here are the only ones that can
benefit from humor. Rather, my contention is simply that self-transcendence, as
it has been defined in this essay, and the capacity to laugh at ourselves can help
facilitate the development of a number of moral virtues that we generally value.27
In other words, being able to look at ourselves humorously, through the eyes of
others, can make it easier for us to cultivate humility, open-mindedness, honesty,
and patience. While our sense of humor is not in itself a moral virtue,28 when used
judiciously (especially in order to make fun of ourselves), it can help us enhance
other, generally recognized virtues.

Laughing at Ourselves in Educational Encounters

What might happen to the quality of educational encounters when teachers
become more comfortable with humor in general and laughing at themselves in
particular? Consider the following anecdote related to me by Ms. G, a foreign-born,
high school Spanish teacher:
A couple of years ago in early November, my Spanish 3 students asked me to tell them about
what my son dressed up as for Halloween. Wishing to encourage my students to practice
listening and speaking in Spanish, I proceeded to share with them how my six-year-old dressed
up as Bud-weis-er. The students were astounded and said: ‘‘You mean you let your son dress
up as a beer?’’ Recognizing the confusion, I said: ‘‘No, no. Not a beer. You know; that character
from the movie Toy Story.’’ Suddenly, one student shouted out: ‘‘Oh! You mean he dressed up
as Buzz Lightyear.’’ The next thing I noticed was that all the students were falling from their
chairs, roaring in laughter. I immediately joined in the general bliss, continuing to laugh for
the next five minutes. . . . The rest of the lesson was very productive with my students eagerly
participating in all of the oral and written activities.

26. Carlin’s humorous comment is cited in Morreall’s Comic Relief, 67.

27. The relation between the kind of humor that makes fun of oneself and the development of a number
of moral virtues outlined here should not be confused with a direct causal connection. What is at stake
here is merely a correlation rather than a relation based on linear causality. I do not believe that the
capacity to laugh at ourselves is a precondition for the virtues described. Still, I think that there is a
strong case to be made that this capacity can help foster moral virtues such as humility, patience, and
open-mindedness.
28. I do not consider humor a moral virtue because it can be used to unjustly deride people or make
racist, sexist, and other derogatory remarks toward others. Thus, humor is not necessarily motivated by
good intentions and does not always produce beneficial results.
746 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

Ms. G’s anecdote illustrates some of the benefits of humor in the classroom
and, especially, what might happen when a teacher feels comfortable enough to
join in the laughter, even when the butt of the humor is the teacher herself.
It confirms many of the results of existing studies that suggest that humor and
laughter can reduce anxiety, create a positive learning environment, and increase
student motivation and enjoyment of the topic. For instance, R.L. Garner found
that ‘‘the use of appropriate humor can facilitate a more relaxed atmosphere and
provide a cognitive break that allows the student to assimilate the information.’’29
To be sure, the pedagogical benefits of humor are not really new and should not
be very surprising for educators and philosophers. After all, John Dewey already
noted, as much as a hundred years ago, the close connections between work and
play in the curriculum and that the latter enhances students’ interest in and
motivation for learning. For instance, in Democracy and Education Dewey wrote,
‘‘it is the business of the school to set up an environment in which play and
work shall be conducted with reference to facilitating desirable mental and moral
growth.’’30 More recently, James March outlined some of the most common biases
against playfulness in research as well as the intellectual and creative benefits of
play. March noted that
Playfulness is a natural outgrowth of our standard view of reason. A strict insistence on
purpose, consistency, and rationality limits our ability to find new purposes. Play relaxes
that insistence to allow us to act ‘‘unintelligently’’ or ‘‘irrationally’’ or ‘‘foolishly’’ to explore
alternative ideas of possible purposes and alternative concepts of behavioral consistency. And
it does this while maintaining our basic commitment to the necessity of intelligence.31

March’s basic argument about playfulness in the context of academic research

could be easily made about humor in pedagogical settings. Just as playfulness
can be consistent with reason and intelligence so can humor be compatible
with an attitude of seriousness and rigorous learning. As the case of Ms. G’s class
illustrates, humor and laughter can easily coexist with productive work. Moreover,
as a form of playfulness, humor can help students relax so that they can think
more critically and creatively. According to Alleen Nilsen, ‘‘humor at its best is
excellent for challenging the status quo, and we need to make sure that we’re
not getting in its way.’’32 Cris Mayo echoes this sentiment, noting that ‘‘humor
is an invitation to think differently, from another perspective, while at the same
time inhabiting one’s own perspective; in other words, humor encourages one to
learn.’’33
Most importantly, the ability of Ms. G to laugh at herself and ‘‘to go with the
flow’’ once she recognized why her students were laughing underscores the value

29. R.L. Garner, ‘‘Humor in Pedagogy: How Ha-Ha Can Lead to Aha!’’ College Teaching 54, no. 1
(2006): 179.
30. John Dewey, Democracy and Education (New York: The Free Press, 1966), 196.
31. James G. March, ‘‘Model Bias in Social Action,’’ Review of Educational Research 42, no. 4 (1972): 425.
32. Alleen Pace Nilsen, ‘‘In Defense of Humor,’’ College English 56, no. 8 (1994): 931.
33. Mayo, ‘‘Being in on the Joke,’’ 245.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 747

of teachers having some blithe humility and patience in their interactions with
students. Such a humorous situation presents a real teachable moment for both
the students and the teacher. For students, watching teachers laugh at themselves
when they err helps students realize that teachers are human too and that learning
a new language, math, or any subject is a difficult process that entails making
mistakes. For teachers, the ability to take part in the amusement especially when
it is directed at them presents an opportunity to become more humble and patient
with their students. As mentioned previously, a cheerful humility entails the
capacity to look at oneself honestly, yet humorously — that is, to openly examine
oneself without becoming defensive. And patience is demonstrated by an ability to
put up with some spontaneous misbehavior and not get easily irritated by others.
Obviously, getting laughed at by one’s students can be a very embarrassing and
challenging situation for any teacher. Yet, to the extent that teachers can approach
such a situation with humor as opposed to anger or frustration, they are likely to
develop more humility and patience.
A different example of a teacher who uses humor and knows how to laugh
at himself comes from one of my colleagues, Professor D. Professor D teaches
undergraduate English courses as well as a graduate course on the teaching of
poetry to preservice teachers. He is generally regarded by students as a very
demanding and passionate teacher who does not hold back and lays it all on the
line in the classroom. In a recent visit to one of his classes on the teaching of
poetry, I witnessed Professor D’s humor in action. While discussing his students’
pedestrian attempts to write poetry, he shared with them some of his own mediocre
poems, emphasizing how important, albeit difficult, it is to avoid using clichés. At
one point during the discussion on the use of worn-out language, a male student
in the back of the room tried to suggest that they ‘‘already knew this!’’ Professor D
emphatically interrupted, shouting: ‘‘You don’t really know this stuff; none of you
knows this. You are a bunch of ignoramuses, just like me. It takes one to know
one!’’ I looked around the room and noticed several students quietly chuckling to
themselves; others had a nervous smile on their face. Once Professor D began to
laugh vociferously at his own humor many of the students joined the festivity.
This incident illustrates the case of a teacher who is skilled at using self-
deprecating humor to shock students and to get them to think differently and
outside the box. Indeed, Professor D’s sarcastic pronouncements and unpredictable
manner are very effective in getting students to think more critically and creatively.
Professor D’s humor consists in part of presenting himself as a ‘‘self-effacing clown’’
who is not afraid to laugh at himself while simultaneously holding his students’
feet to the fire. As he explained to me, ‘‘by laughing at my own meager efforts
to be fresh and original, I find that students are generally willing to open up to
constructive self-criticism and to strive for a higher standard of language-play
in that most difficult of arts — the writing of poetry.’’ Students in Professor D’s
classes report that they were challenged like never before to work hard and give
every ounce of themselves on the various assignments that he requires. In short,
Professor D’s teaching demonstrates the notion that humor and laughter can
coexist with productive work and rigorous learning.
748 EDUCATIONAL THEORY Volume 60 Number 6 2010

The case of Professor D also illustrates some possible links between the ability
to laugh at ourselves and the moral virtues of honesty and open-mindedness. In the
lesson I observed, Professor D’s humor was revealed by his frank admission that he
is as ignorant as his students and, like them, struggles to write good poetry. As he
shared with me after the lesson, ‘‘I am just another human humbled by the diffi-
culty to make meaning; as a ‘professor’ of writing, I think it critical to show them
my own work and how I struggle with making language fresh.’’ In addition, Profes-
sor D uses humor to challenge his students to be more critical and reflective, that
is, to question what they think they already know. As a Socratic teacher, he encour-
ages his students to be more open-minded and honest in their writing of poetry,
even as he makes fun of his own mediocre poems. Learning from the example of
Professor D, teachers can use humor and laughing at themselves as a way of mod-
eling the value of both honesty and open-mindedness in educational encounters.
In doing so, their students will hopefully begin to internalize the significance of
these moral virtues for education in particular and for their lives in general.
Conclusions and Caveats
While the examples of Ms. G and Professor D had a positive outcome, I
recognize that this is not always the case. There are other instances in which
using humor in the classroom does not achieve its purpose or even has a nega-
tive outcome. For example, teachers’ jokes, sarcastic remarks, or self-deprecating
humor can be misinterpreted by students, leading them to feel offended, mistrust
the teacher, and ultimately lose interest in the lesson. It is certainly possible
that Professor D’s self-effacing humor and his in-your-face style of teaching may
have moved some of his students to lose confidence and be less willing to take
risks in his classroom. As such, humor is really no different than many other
interventions and techniques that teachers use (such as pushing their students to
work harder or critiquing their ideas), which can have both positive and negative
effects. Experience shows that there is often a fine line between the sensible use of
humor and laughter and their overuse or misuse. An expert teacher usually knows
when humor is called for and how not to cross this line.
In addition to the issue of the judicious use of humor, there are matters of insti-
tutional authority that may complicate the efforts to exercise humor in schools
and classrooms. For instance, there are aspects of the teaching profession — such
as maintaining discipline and control of the classroom — that can make it difficult
for teachers to embrace a humorous attitude and laugh at themselves. Moreover,
education implies that there are subjects to be learned and, yes, tests to be taken
and passed. If teachers want their students to take seriously the content they are
presenting and work hard to master it, they may need to display a firm and forceful
stance in the classroom. Yet, I would argue that it is precisely self-transcendence
and the capacity to take themselves less seriously that can help teachers maintain
their composure and keep things in perspective in those moments that call for a
more stern and businesslike approach. Indeed, teachers’ sense of humor can help
them not only cope with the multiple challenges they face but also mitigate the
tendency of some educators to lose hope and become burned out.
Gordon Learning to Laugh at Ourselves 749

My analysis also suggests that humor and laughter can help teachers and
students form better relationships and come to see each other as human beings
who are jointly responsible for the success of the learning process. The cases of
Ms. G and Professor D indicate that humor and laughter not only can coexist
with rigorous learning and investigation, but can actually enhance them. To the
extent that we are able to take ourselves less seriously as educators, we can more
easily ‘‘adopt certain stances without fully endorsing them. We can question our
authority, and invite others to question it, even within contexts that arrogate
authority to us whether we wish it or not.’’34 Thus, in embracing a humorous
stance, we have a greater chance of helping our students become more open to
constructive criticism and to thinking in new and creative ways.
Finally, the examples of Ms. G and Professor D indicate that there is a positive
correlation between learning to laugh at ourselves and the development of a num-
ber of moral virtues that are significant for teachers. When teachers are able to
transcend their immediate, self-centered perspective and to view themselves from
the standpoint of others (perspectives that are often humorous), they are likely to
become more humble, honest, open-minded, and patient in their interactions with
their students. To be sure, there is no guarantee that such a transformation will
take place, given that human beings are unpredictable and teaching is an elaborate
and nuanced profession, one that is full of demands and surprises. However, my
contention is simply that self-transcendence and the ability to laugh at ourselves
are, generally speaking, healthy responses that can facilitate the development of
several qualities we value in teaching. Responding with humor can also help
teachers negotiate many of the daily challenges that characterize this critical,
highly complex field we call education.

34. See Nicholas Burbules’s essay ‘‘Postmodern Doubt and Philosophy of Education,’’ Philosophy of
Education 1995, ed. Alven Neiman (Urbana, Illinois: Philosophy of Education Society, 1995), 6.