Bateson's concept of “metacommunication” in play

Abstract

Gregory Bateson's concept of “metacommunication,” defined as communication which refers to communication, is examined in relation to play. Bateson believed that animals in play recognize that their activities simulate, and therefore refer to, other activities, and in this way metacommunicate. A similar conception of play by H. Paul Grice is described, and the development and demise of metacommunication in the play literature is presented. Two forms of metacommunication are present in some nonhuman play: The first occurs when an organism recognizes that another is simulating, and the second occurs when an organism recognizes that it is itself simulating. Some nonhuman organisms-rhesus monkey—also appear to intend to metacommunicate in play. Metacommunication in animal behavior tells us something about how these organisms interpret themselves and one another, and informs us that animals understand that an activity can have more than one reference. The existence of metacommunication in nonhumans suggests that nonhuman primates already have capacities for depiction and denotation necessary for the evolution of human language.