One hundred years later, does Marcel Mauss's definition of prayer still provide us with useful analytical suggestions? In his opinion, the central question to answer was how does one pass from speaking to demanding: that is, why do the gods respond? In this paper, inspired by contemporary debates in philosophy and animal communication, we propose that it is possible today to advance a little further in the door left open by the father of sociology when he finally decided to give up on the work that his contemporaries hoped would be his greatest.
prayer; religion; communication