Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Head Shop >

K-I-S-S-I-N-G

03:57 / 12.06.02

note: I don't really know where to put this so feel free to move it whereever you guys think it goes)

NOW, kissing. I want to know about it. Why we do it? Why is locking lips so important? What void does tongue fencing fill? When did it start? Have human always kissed? Is it biological? Do other primates kiss or do they just groom themselves? Is it cultural? Is it just a western thing (and later speard to non-westerners) or does every culture develope kissing independantly? Answers and opinions wanted.

05:54 / 12.06.02

The lips and the region around the mouth (inlcuding the flesh of the nostirls, septum) have the highest concentration of nerve endings (for pressure, heat, etc.) for the tactile sensations...I can't remember, but I think even more or equal to those on the erogenous zones of the sex organs. The tongue is similarly hyper-tactile sensitive. This includes the systems that register pain/pleasure.
(If someone could find a psych illustration of a homonculus - an anthropomorphic diagram of human nerve destiny - it would visually expalin this far more simply)

Ever notice how a cut on your lip feels enormous when you know it's actually tiny? That corresponds to the nerve density gicing you more information per surface area about the afflicted area. Similarly, when you see small children pressing objects to their mouths often they feeling the object with lips (as well as receiving gustatory and olfactory data).

We see kissing amongst chimps and bonobos; I cannot confirm kissing data on other apes (gorilla, orangutan, gibbon). I am fairly sure that the answer is nay, or that such behavior is far rarer. Farther away on the cladogram there is very little mouth-to-mouth interaction, but one sees mouth-to-body interactions such as social grooming, bathing, licking etc. These are not erotic kisses, but they clearly establish meaning within ethological socialization. Outside of mammals, I have no clue, but I'll take a flying guess and say that kissing fish are some sort of wonky aberration which we anthropomorphize value upon.

It is sometimes theorized that kissing as an erotic act correlates in some fashion to copulation involving ventral contact - that is, facing one another as opposed to "doggy style" - which is only demonstrated by humans and the Pongidae.

As far as I know, kissing is endemic to human nature, rather than invented...I'm not sure if there's a viable method of testing out whether the idea of a kiss started one place and diffused or whatever. I can, however, suggest that cultural differentiation determines the significance of kissing, the variety of distinctions, and the contextual meaning. Furthermore, culture establishs display rules about the activity of kissing, meaning that an outside observer may not be privy to the social context in which kissing occurs.

18:21 / 12.06.02

Useless Knowledge offers that the custom of romantic kissing, as opposed to kissing between mother and child, really started in 6th century France.
I’ve also heard that kissing (and the reason why dogs lick affectionately) goes back to food-sharing; that mothers chew food for toothless babies and give it to them mouth-to-mouth, and our modern behavior stems from that primal technique. Personally, I don’t know if this explanation is literally true, but I think it feels right, so I’ll hold on to it.

18:42 / 12.06.02

its one of the first bridges to physical intimacy - a relationship (any relationship) is strengthened by touch. even merely touching the skin of a person you hold dear can be an amazing experience - add to that the relatively intimate nature of the mouth (as opposed to, say, a hand, which is more readily shared). and potential penetration into another person...by this I dont mean something necessarily sexual - while it certainly can be theres something familiar and warm about being so closely locked with another person, beyond the physical limits of simple embrace.

11:57 / 15.06.02

Hmm, I've read somewhere that kissing is not universal, and that an anthropologist couple scandalised some tribe or other somewhere by doing it. Until I can find a reference for that however, I'm not sure whether to join Monkey's 'nature' explanation or Grant's 'nurture' explanation. Will try to hunt that one down.

17:08 / 15.06.02

Mine isn't exactly a "nature-only" explanation: the physio/ethological data was attempting more to deal with the issue of why it's a more vivid sensory experience than, let's say, rubbing elbows. Whether between a diad of lovers or mother-child, mouth contact generates intimacy through contact, and while there is no simle physio measure of intimacy, it is often felt that the tactile nerve destiny contributes to that subjective sense of the former...regardless of the (culturally defined) relationship dynamic between the subjects of the kiss.

The act of kissing amongst homo sapiens is strongly enculturated: it has rules that vary from place to place and group to group. In a way, you could even make the case that every individual "discovers" kissing - the muscle movements, the skills required - independently...sure, they know of the *concept*, but actually doing it is a different matter entirely.

Grant - no personal insult intended, but the Useless Knowledge link lives up to its name in an entirely unintended fashion. Most explicitly there are sex manuals, pillow books, erotic poetry, and pornographic art that depict/explain
kissing which are considerably older and wider spread. Linguistically, one can find words in Sanksrit, Farsi, Putonghua, for kissing that are millenia older. What you may find with the 6th-century reference is that it was a time/space locale where romantic kissing became publicly popular (again) within a larger cultural context...in a way, a fad that persisted.

Kissing, being an idea bound-up, but sometimes liminal to, sexual expression, has oscillated as a publically acceptable activity...and like other sexual activities and social appendages related to sex, has sometimes (and in some places) between consciously omitted from collective recall and public performance because of stigma (often religiously based).

[A more common example of the same recognized/silenced process in public culture - and within the "private" domain that is nonetheless open to public criticism and scrutiny - is society's recall/recognition of prostitution. While the process is ongoing, at various times the issue has been pulled in and out of public attention as a point of shame, controversy, etc.]

Haus about we all give each other a big lovely huggle?

15:10 / 16.06.02

Catullus seems quite keen on romantic kissing, which would move the inception date back about 7 centuries. There is an example of father-daughter kissing (with tongues!) in Aristophanes. Not sure about romantic kissing between men and women earlier than that - if I get a chance will look it up.