The social meaning and function of humour in physiotherapy practice: An ethnography

ABSTRACT

An ethnographic study was undertaken over a period of 8 months to explore the social meaning and function of humour in the practice of a team of physiotherapists in a UK National Health Service hospital. Interviews were carried out following the observations to gain the therapists' perspectives in an open critical exploration of assumptions and ideas. The analysis was iterative and followed a systematic recognised ethnographic approach. The findings revealed explicit and implicit meanings of the team's humorous interactions. Explicitly, they appeared light-hearted and enhanced camaraderie but implicitly they demonstrated the team leadership and management skills of the most senior member of the team who had an authoritative influence on the other members, and facilitated this explicit marker of membership. By hiding their concerns in humour, the team members were able to avoid a real confrontation with issues of authority and hierarchy that underscored these activities. Humour, in this instance, was used as a stabilising force to give the team a sense of certainty juxtaposed by the prevailing unpredictability of their daily activities; it was part of their professional culture to allow them to handle stressful situations and to build up a socialisation process. By creating a collective identity, the individual members came to understand the team's underlying philosophy of practice. As a resource, humour was seen to be used as a vehicle of negotiation and a catalyst for change.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The author would like to acknowledge the contributions of Dr. Barbara Richardson and Dr. Barbara Steward to this article and also the physiotherapy team who so generously agreed to take part in this study.

Declaration of Interest: The author reports no conflicts of interest. The author alone is responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Notes

¹David Beckham is a well-known footballer whose wife was a former singer in a band known as the Spice Girls.

²North/South divide-stereotypical phrase indicating differences between Northerners and Southerners.

³Edwina Curry Minister for Health under Margaret Thatcher was famous for saying Northerners had a poor diet.