Animals don’t “express” each other (Symbolic process beginning with “animal gestures”—Gendlin and Mead: 1)

Gendlin’s theory of “animal gestures” has its roots in the previous studies of Charles Darwin (1809–1882), Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920), and George Herbert Mead (1863–1931). In this article, I would like to focus on how Darwin’s theory of the expression of emotions was criticized by subsequent generations.

In “Chapter VII-A: Symbolic Process” of “A Process Model,” there is a section with the ironically titled “e) Expression.” What this section ultimately argues is that when animals appear to express something internal to each other, we human observers are simply projecting themselves, and the animals do not actually express anything internal to each other:

The animals express quite a lot, but except for special behaviors, these carry only us forward. The animals do not express, therefore, to each other. (Gendlin, 1997/2018, p. 122)

Let us now overview the roots of the idea above.

First, Darwin (1872)’s theory of the expression of emotions was criticized by Wundt (1900):

Darwin was interested in ... gestures because they expressed emotions, and he dealt with them very largely as if this were their sole function. ... he saw in the attitude of the dog the joy with which he accompanied his master in taking a walk. ... It was easy for Wundt to show that this was not a legitimate point of attack on the problem of these gestures. They did not at bottom serve the function of expression of the emotions... (Mead, 1934, pp. 43–4)

Second, Wundt (1900)’s argument was taken over by Mead (1934):

It is quite impossible to assume that animals do undertake to express their emotions. They certainly do not undertake to express them for the benefit of other animals. ... They [expressions] certainly could not exist in these lower animals as means of expressing emotions; we cannot approach them from the point of view of expressing a content in the mind of the individual. (Mead, 1934, pp. 16–7)

We see that an animal is angry and that he is going to attack. We know that that is in the action of the animal, and is revealed by the attitude of the animal. We cannot say the animal means it in the sense that he has a reflective determination to attack. (Mead, 1934, p. 45)

Third, Mead (1934)’s arguments were taken over by Gendlin (1973):

Animals fight. This fighting itself is not an emotion, of course. But when animals are about to fight, they get ready to fight, and that involves a gamut of processes and behaviors. In cats, for example, thickening of the tail, rapid blood circulation, stiffening of the muscles, and so forth occur. We humans, looking on, say the cats are angry. There is no doubt that a sentient body going through these changes feels the changes, and in this sense fight-readying is anger for the cats. However, cats engage in this only as being about to fight. (Gendlin, 1973, p. 374)

How the body looks and sounds, the patterning of face and posture and sound, we call “expression.” The living body’s expressive patterning affects others of the same species even in animals, although for them such patterns are part of behavior, of situation-changing. (Gendlin, 1973, p. 375)

Finally, we arrive at the discussion of “e) Expression” in “A Process Model” (Gendlin, 1997/2018) quoted at the beginning of this article, and the discussion concludes as follows:

What does carry them [animals] forward is that they behave with each other. Or you might say that for them behaving and expressing are not yet differentiated into two different levels. (Gendlin, 1997/2018, p. 122)

References

Darwin, C. (1872). The expression of the emotions in man and animals. John Murray.

Gendlin, E.T. (1973). A phenomenology of emotions: anger. In D. Carr & E.S. Casey (Eds.), Explorations in phenomenology: papers of the society for phenomenology and existential philosophy (pp. 367-98). Martinus Nijhoff.

Gendlin, E. T. (1997/2018). A process model. Northwestern University Press.

Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self, and society: from the standpoint of a social behaviorist. (edited by C.W. Morris). University of Chicago Press.

Wundt, W. (1900). Die Sprache (Völkerpsychologie: eine Untersuchung der Entwicklungsgesetze von Sprache, Mythus und Sitte, vol. 3). W. Engelmann.