Laugh like a lady
Laugh like a lady….
Every girl’s college has its favourite disciplinarian. In my college, the focus of our lives was the quick-tempered Mrs. Quazi. She had a beautiful singing voice, a warm sense of humour and a nose like the prow of a ship.
One day, she called the 11th class students aside for a special impromptu lecture. “Girls!” she said, “I’ve been listening to some of you laughing and I’m sorry to say, you sound like…” she paused to choose a suitable example, “…hyenas!” When she wanted to make a point, her voice rose high enough to loosen the fillings in teeth.
We snuffled and snorted in response, whereupon she exclaimed, “That’s just what I mean!” She followed up with a highly exaggerated instant replay of the sounds we had made. There was the explosive “HAH!”, the hearty ‘haw-haw-haw!’, the nasal ‘snee-snee-snee!’, the machine-gun ‘heh-eh-eh-eh!’ and the utterly ungainly ‘gurk!gurk!gurk!’, sometimes accompanied by a loud, guttural grunting at the end, ‘gnaaaarhhh!’ It just wouldn’t do, she told us. In order to grow into proper ladies, we must learn to laugh with greater decorum. A couple of us protested immediately. “Wouldn’t that be false, Mam?” we asked. “And unnatural?”
“You can be perfectly natural and still have an attractive laugh,” she insisted. “It should be sweet and pretty, like the tinkling of little silver bell heard in the distance: A-hahahaha-uhh!” she demonstrated. A slight intake of breadth, a mild whinnying, followed by a final delicate gasp. “Don’t throw your head back, don’t open your mouth wide – you’re not visiting a dentist – and most of all, don’t break the sound barrier!” She got us to practise a few times and even though we were gargling much more than we were tinkling, the lesson got through: There is a right and wrong way even for something as spontaneous as laughter.
Do respectable young men get similar lessons, I wonder? I didn’t ask myself this question at that time and anyway, my own laugh being of the hearty machine-gun brand, it was clear then that I would never gain membership to the Lady’s Circle when I grew up. But I often thought back upon that little lecture. It was hilarious, at the time, but the point of it was that we needed control, modify and suppress the freedoms we had known as young girls, so as to remain acceptable to our social class. Laughter is supposedly involuntary, a response to a remark or situation that is absurd enough to cause us to make an audible sound. Most people look forward to laughter, and I’m one of them. It is said that humour is good for the nervous system; even an artificial smile causes beneficial relaxation to trickle through the mysterious wiring of our brain. Yet for a girl to become a woman, she needs to rein in her behaviour, lower her emotional profile and appear to be the model of quite restraint.
As our mam said, “an open, laughing mouth brings up associations with the Other Orifice”. This may be why we’re encouraged to cover our mouths while laughing, yawning, or doing anything else which requires us to open our mouth wide. Perhaps the sight of a woman laughing uninhibitedly creates the impression of uninhibited sexuality – and we certainly know that’s taboo – so as a fail-safe, nicely brought up girls are told to avoid extreme hilarity altogether.
Like I said, however I didn’t expect to become a lady – and I haven’t. I kept right on laughing raucously regardless of Mrs. Q’s advice. My repertoire has expanded to include the explosive rattle (‘HAH-huhuhuh!’), the nasal gurk (‘snurk-snurk’), and the helpless rattling giggle (‘hah!hah!hah!’). I’ve been at it all till now and haven’t suffered too much for my excesses.
You know how they tell you that you must not laugh to much or else you’ll cry? It isn’t true. I’ve certainly cried a number of times in my life, but I’ve definitely laughed a lot more.
Aha! As for the respectable young men, I have no idea whether or not they’re taught hoe to laugh. Frankly, I wouldn’t mind it if some of them showed a little restraint now and then. It would be nice, for instance, if they covered their mouths while eating and sat with the ankles nicely crossed with none of that rhythmic foot-jittering and knee-flapping we get to see in waiting rooms. A little less burping, farting and crotch-scratching too, would be much appreciated too!
Snurk!snurk!snurk!
Every girl’s college has its favourite disciplinarian. In my college, the focus of our lives was the quick-tempered Mrs. Quazi. She had a beautiful singing voice, a warm sense of humour and a nose like the prow of a ship.
One day, she called the 11th class students aside for a special impromptu lecture. “Girls!” she said, “I’ve been listening to some of you laughing and I’m sorry to say, you sound like…” she paused to choose a suitable example, “…hyenas!” When she wanted to make a point, her voice rose high enough to loosen the fillings in teeth.
We snuffled and snorted in response, whereupon she exclaimed, “That’s just what I mean!” She followed up with a highly exaggerated instant replay of the sounds we had made. There was the explosive “HAH!”, the hearty ‘haw-haw-haw!’, the nasal ‘snee-snee-snee!’, the machine-gun ‘heh-eh-eh-eh!’ and the utterly ungainly ‘gurk!gurk!gurk!’, sometimes accompanied by a loud, guttural grunting at the end, ‘gnaaaarhhh!’ It just wouldn’t do, she told us. In order to grow into proper ladies, we must learn to laugh with greater decorum. A couple of us protested immediately. “Wouldn’t that be false, Mam?” we asked. “And unnatural?”
“You can be perfectly natural and still have an attractive laugh,” she insisted. “It should be sweet and pretty, like the tinkling of little silver bell heard in the distance: A-hahahaha-uhh!” she demonstrated. A slight intake of breadth, a mild whinnying, followed by a final delicate gasp. “Don’t throw your head back, don’t open your mouth wide – you’re not visiting a dentist – and most of all, don’t break the sound barrier!” She got us to practise a few times and even though we were gargling much more than we were tinkling, the lesson got through: There is a right and wrong way even for something as spontaneous as laughter.
Do respectable young men get similar lessons, I wonder? I didn’t ask myself this question at that time and anyway, my own laugh being of the hearty machine-gun brand, it was clear then that I would never gain membership to the Lady’s Circle when I grew up. But I often thought back upon that little lecture. It was hilarious, at the time, but the point of it was that we needed control, modify and suppress the freedoms we had known as young girls, so as to remain acceptable to our social class. Laughter is supposedly involuntary, a response to a remark or situation that is absurd enough to cause us to make an audible sound. Most people look forward to laughter, and I’m one of them. It is said that humour is good for the nervous system; even an artificial smile causes beneficial relaxation to trickle through the mysterious wiring of our brain. Yet for a girl to become a woman, she needs to rein in her behaviour, lower her emotional profile and appear to be the model of quite restraint.
As our mam said, “an open, laughing mouth brings up associations with the Other Orifice”. This may be why we’re encouraged to cover our mouths while laughing, yawning, or doing anything else which requires us to open our mouth wide. Perhaps the sight of a woman laughing uninhibitedly creates the impression of uninhibited sexuality – and we certainly know that’s taboo – so as a fail-safe, nicely brought up girls are told to avoid extreme hilarity altogether.
Like I said, however I didn’t expect to become a lady – and I haven’t. I kept right on laughing raucously regardless of Mrs. Q’s advice. My repertoire has expanded to include the explosive rattle (‘HAH-huhuhuh!’), the nasal gurk (‘snurk-snurk’), and the helpless rattling giggle (‘hah!hah!hah!’). I’ve been at it all till now and haven’t suffered too much for my excesses.
You know how they tell you that you must not laugh to much or else you’ll cry? It isn’t true. I’ve certainly cried a number of times in my life, but I’ve definitely laughed a lot more.
Aha! As for the respectable young men, I have no idea whether or not they’re taught hoe to laugh. Frankly, I wouldn’t mind it if some of them showed a little restraint now and then. It would be nice, for instance, if they covered their mouths while eating and sat with the ankles nicely crossed with none of that rhythmic foot-jittering and knee-flapping we get to see in waiting rooms. A little less burping, farting and crotch-scratching too, would be much appreciated too!
Snurk!snurk!snurk!
posted by the silhouette | Thursday, January 19, 2006
1 Comments:
interesting... but this isnt the first time i am hearing this kind of a complaint u know.... girls before have told me the very same thing... but point to be noted, that the person who had a problem with the girls laughin like hyenas was a woman herself.. so in a way, women themselves have a habit of creating some inbuilt synthetic make bilief constraints for themselves... dnt misunderstand, am not tryin to rage a man vs woman battle here, am just tryin to put some perspective...
the age old "to do" things that the women had been forcrd to do, especially in their day to day household, were more often than not, enforced by women themselves... be it the mother before the marraige, or the mother in law, after.... and wenever we have seen a progressive lady, we have also noticed the contibution of their mothers (not so much of the father) behind her... be it florence nightangle, marie curie, diana, or rani rashmoni....
now comin back to the smiling part... well, as a man, i dnt really mind a woman laughin histerically... but at the same time i would be lying if i said that i love a woman, or for that matter a man, snorting or grunting like a pig while laughin... the question here is not how the "women" should behave in public, the questions is, how, people, in general should.... none of us like any man grunting like a pig in the name of laughing, do we? the same goes for women... and ppl who say that only the women should laugh in a certain way, they are just brought up that way... and wen they impart such half baked knowledge to the young generation,that becomes harmful for the society...dnt think any self respecting, educted and well brought up man minds a woman laughing out loudly, just as a woman dont mind the man doin the same....
and as far as the croch scraching et al are concerned, well, not all men scratch their croch infront of every one do they? jst as not all women have hair that stinks, or hands and legs that arnt shaved, or women who scratch their ears with all their might.... so you see, one has to take the good with the bad and not become judgemntal and make it a chauvenist-feminist battle, thats juvenile.... in the end, wat matters is, how are we brought up, and how civilized are we with respect to the society...
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