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Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious (German: Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten) written by Sigmund Freud is a book published in 1905. Within this work, Freud assesses prior studies on jokes and establishes a characterisation of jokes. These characteristics are, then, linked to psychodynamics hereby dealing with Freud's understanding of the unconscious mind and his earlier work "dreamwork".

Context

In the context of humour and laughter, prior theories were formulated. Most notably, the superiority theory by Aristotle as well as the incongruency theory by Cicero. The prior describes that humans laugh whenever they feel superior to the subject which they laugh about. The latter entails an unexpected shift in perspective. The agent laughs whenever they are introduced into a new possibility to see the world, often showing a rather simple or inadequate viewpoint not taken before.

Prior attempts of psychological and philosophical analysis of jokes had been made by Jean Paul, Theodor Lipps, Theodor Vischer, and Kuno Fischer before the book was published. Most of these analysis reconcile the joke with humor. Freud referred to there works within Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious and aimed to form a more conclusive theory on jokes independent of humor, thereby expanding the understanding of these authors.

Allegedly, Willhelm Fließ provoked the establishment of the book by criticizing Freud's earlier dreamwork. It is hypothesized that Freud established the work to reply to Fließ's comment. These comments mainly criticising that there are apparent jokes within dreams and Freud's observation of joke-like structures and associations within dreams.

Due to this critique, Freud strongly connected his dreamwork with the term "Witzarbeit", translating to jokework within the first part of his book. "Eine so weitgehende Übereinstimmung wie die zwischen den Mitteln der Witzarbeit und denen der Traumarbeit wird kaum eine zufällige sein." ("A correspondence as far-reaching as that between the means of jokework and those of dreamwork can hardly be accidental.")

Content

The book is segmented into three parts, namely an analytic part, a synthetic part, and a theoretic part.

Introduction:

Within the work, he suggests that these are distributed pieces which he will "zu einem Organischem Ganzen zusammenführen", reuniting them into a organic whole.

Analytic part: Techniques and tendencies of the Joke

Within this part Freud introduces the techniques and tendencies of the joke, elaborating them by introducing a joke and subsequently explaining the mechanism which the joke applies. Freud works out Condensation (for example in the contraction of words, when ‘familiär’ and ‘millionaire’ are combined to form ‘famillionär’), as a central tendency of jokes. This includes information about mixed word formation, modification, the use of identical (word) material, rearrangements, simple modifications and others. The double meaning in wordplay is another central tendency. The latter includes metaphorical and factual meaning, as well as ambiguity among others.

Further the central tendencies of love and the expression of aggression are introduced. Freud suggests that especially within tendentious joke, the joke allows for our primal instincts and tendencies to be addressed. He hypothesizes that a satisfaction of these instincts takes place while an obstacle is apparent. This obstacle can be seen as a restriction to live out the presented instincts because of societal conventions. Because this obstacle can be overcome by the joke, it allows for a source of pleasure which could not otherwise be reached.

Synthetic part

Within the synthetic part Freud focusses on the exact mechanism of derived pleasure, as well as motives of the joke. Further, the joke as a societal process is discussing. These insights are based upon the hypothesized working of derived pleasure described before. He elaborates that a gain of lust or pleasure is established, when somebody is the recipient but not when somebody is telling the joke. The part telling the joke needs to exert the psychic energy that the recipient gains from removing the inhibition or obstacle. Hence, the one telling the joke cannot laugh about their own joke, according to Freud.

Theoretic part

In the concluding chapter of his book, Freud explores how wit relates to dreams and the unconscious. He suggests that a preconscious thought is briefly processed by the unconscious and then immediately recognized by the conscious mind. This allows individuals to revert to a childlike psychic state where reality's constraints are minimal, as evidenced by the fact that children do not engage in joke creation.

Freud broadens his analysis to include comedy and humor, summarizing that the pleasure derived from wit, comedy, and humor comes from mental economy—saving effort in inhibition, presentation, and emotion, respectively. These forms of pleasure represent methods to regain joy from mental activities that was lost during development. The euphoria aimed for through these mechanisms mirrors the carefree mental state of childhood, a time when people did not need humor or wit to feel happy.

Reception

The book was published in 1905 in Austria and Germany and later translated into English by J. Strauchey, intended to reach a bigger audience. The translated version was thereafter published by F. Deuticke in 1960 within the Unites States.

After publishing dreamwork in 1900, Freud started to work on seminal texts and the refinement of his theories. During the establishment of the book, Sigmund Freud additionally worked on two other literary works, including "Bruchstück einer Hysterieanalyse" (Fragment of a hysteria analysis), also known as the case of Dora, and "Drei Abhandlungen der Sexualtheorie" (Three treatises on sexual theory).

These texts showcase an extension of dreamwork and the introduction of sexual motives into his theory. Jokes and Its Relation to the Unconscious similarly advances Freud's theoretical basis and introduces an development "von der Nachtseite der Träume auf die seelische Wachexistenz", meaning "from the night side of dreams to the waking existence of the soul", according to Peter-André Alt.

As described by Lippman (1962), the book seems to be rather complex rendering its content difficult for a broader audience which resulted in less appreciation form the general public. Despite this lack, the book proved significant in changing the scientific inquiry of humor. Scholars recognized Freud's contribution to understanding the cognitive and emotional dimensions of humor and leveraged the theoretical basis for further scientific inquiry.

As an example, George W. Kelling derived four hypothesis from the discussed work, which he tested empirically using comics with varying content. In this research, Freud's theory on tendentious and non-tendentious jokes, discussed within this work, was able to explain the findings presented within this investigation, constituting an empirical basis for the claims made within the literature. Further, Freud's theory connects to other older and more social and anthropological theories such as Hobbesian superiority or catharsis and Henri Bergson's.

Woody Allen's Annie Hall (1977)

Within popular culture the book found resonance in Woody Allen's movie Annie Hall ("Stadtneurotiker") (1977). The protagonist refers to several jokes with explicit reference to Freud and his work. Further, according to a film critique by Sam B. Girgus, the film discusses themes of psychoanalysis, not only through references to the book and Freud's work but through the entire story line binding together to form an expression of narrative desire pathing a way to the unconscious.