Laughter

In this investigation we extend and replicate previous findings from Author and colleagues (2019) that mothers of Latinx heritage laugh more than mothers of European heritage during their interactions, especially when they have conversations of quality. The authors argued that having conversations of quality may contribute to Latinx’s overall wellbeing. The current study aimed to empirically test this idea. Specifically, we expand upon previous findings by answering the questions: Does a higher proportion of Latinx’s laughter reflect a higher subjective wellbeing? Is there a relation between the quality of Latinx’ conversations and subjective wellbeing? Students of Latinx heritage (SLH: N = 31) and a comparison group of students of European heritage (SEH: N = 43) wore the LENA digital recorder for two days. Laughter and the quality of conversations (substantive vs. small talk) with friends were identified from the recordings. Participants reported their levels of satisfaction with l...

Latinx in the United States have greater life expectancy than other groups, in spite of their socioeconomic and psychosocial disadvantage. This phenomenon has been described as the Latinx health paradox. This investigation observed the interplay of cultural processes and social networks to shed light on this paradox. Latina (N = 26) and White-European (N = 24) mothers wore a digital recorder as they went about their daily lives. Four conversation styles were characterized from the recordings to measure the mothers' quality of their conversations (small talk and substantive conversations) within different social networks (with the father vs. other adults). As a positive indicator of well-being, laughter was assessed during the conversations. Results demonstrated that Latina mothers tend to laugh more than White-European mothers; and that this relation is mediated by substantive conversations with others. This suggests that Latinas' cultural processes afford meaningful conversations, which relates to more behavioral laughter, a process that may have positive implications on well-being.

Objective We sought to examine perceived nervous reactions when first interacting with a particularly attractive person/potential romantic partner. From a theoretical standpoint, we cogitate on the possible adaptive nature of these reactions that appear seemingly counterproductive for future mating success. Methods We documented 280 participants' retrospective self-reports of experiencing a variety of physiological, vocal, and behavioral reactions during an initial encounter with a person they found highly attractive. We also asked participants to rate the reactions of others that they used to determine if another person was attracted to them. Results Participants reported most frequently experiencing increased attentiveness, smiling, staring, heart rate, giggling/laughter, blushing, and difficulty concentrating during this first encounter. Both sexes reported speaking faster and being less able to express themselves clearly, and women reported using a higher pitch and having a more unsteady tone of voice during an initial encounter of attraction. Further, participants reported observing similar nervous reactions by others whom they perceived were attracted to them. These findings were examined while considering individual differences in sociosexual orientation (i.e., propensity toward uncommitted sex), self-perceived mate value, empathy, and gender. Conclusions Participants reported that they did, indeed, experience a cluster of anxiety-related physiological and behavioral reactions during an initial encounter with someone they found highly attractive. Although appearing nervous and awkward during an initial encounter with an attractive other may seem counterproductive for future mating success, we discuss potential adaptive functions for displaying these responses.

Objective We sought to examine perceived nervous reactions when first interacting with a particularly attractive person/potential romantic partner. From a theoretical standpoint, we cogitate on the possible adaptive nature of these reactions that appear seemingly counterproductive for future mating success. Methods We documented 280 participants' retrospective self-reports of experiencing a variety of physiological, vocal, and behavioral reactions during an initial encounter with a person they found highly attractive. We also asked participants to rate the reactions of others that they used to determine if another person was attracted to them. Results Participants reported most frequently experiencing increased attentiveness, smiling, staring, heart rate, giggling/laughter, blushing, and difficulty concentrating during this first encounter. Both sexes reported speaking faster and being less able to express themselves clearly, and women reported using a higher pitch and having a more unsteady tone of voice during an initial encounter of attraction. Further, participants reported observing similar nervous reactions by others whom they perceived were attracted to them. These findings were examined while considering individual differences in sociosexual orientation (i.e., propensity toward uncommitted sex), self-perceived mate value, empathy, and gender. Conclusions Participants reported that they did, indeed, experience a cluster of anxiety-related physiological and behavioral reactions during an initial encounter with someone they found highly attractive. Although appearing nervous and awkward during an initial encounter with an attractive other may seem counterproductive for future mating success, we discuss potential adaptive functions for displaying these responses.

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Jedno od najvažnijih i najvećih dela italijanskog baroka, dugo neshvaćeno i osuđivano od strane kritike zbog neobičnih narativnih i metanarativnih postupaka, otkriva izuzetno dinamičan svet u kome se meša stvarno sa izmišljenim dok vremensko-prostorne granice i logičke veze
u potpunosti nestaju, ustupivši mesto mašti. Tradicionalni italijanski žanr novele čiji je osnovni preduslov verodostojnost, kod Bazilea je preosmišljen: verodostojnost zamenjuje fikcija, čiji je osnovni cilj da začudi, odnosno da nasmeje. Upravo je smeh, tačnije nemogućnost smeha, okosnica tradicionalne okvirne priče i pokretač radnje, a primarni i sekundarni naratori, težeći ka nemogućem, odnosno da nasmeju, zapravo ostvaruju postojanje. Analizom jezika, stilskih postupaka i mehanizama koji upravljaju naracijom, rad će prikazati funkciju i strukturu baroknog nemogućeg, shvaćenog kao sredstvo kojim pisac oblikuje vlastito delo.
Ključne reči: smeh, začudno, metafora, preosmišljavanje, narodno, učeno, nemoguće

The collection of short stories, “Lo cunto de li cunti” or “Pentamerone” is most powerful expression of Baroque rethinking the previous tradition. Led by some of the basic tasks of creative poetics, like seventeenth century’s poetica della meraviglia, the author of the collection shapes his work satisfying the requirements of the audience, who wanted to be astonished by new and peculiar storytelling. By organizing the narration so it can perfectly fit the court atmosphere and creating a literary reflection of everyday life on court, Basile builds stories using a variety of genres, such as legends, folk tales, Greek tragedies and comedies, renaissance stories, but also a variety of techniques, which are often derived from non-literary sphere, for
example theatre. His stories aren’t traditional stories with verisimilar narration, but rather fairy tale alike stories since he used a collective imagination as foundation to his artistic narration. Such pluralism of
genres, so typical for postmodern literature, inevitably causes also stylistic diversity, to which Basile pays special attention. The prose is rich in metaphors, alliteration, assonance, word games, etymological figures,
enumerations which puts aesthetic dimension of the story above any other. However, this stylistic refinement doesn’t have any measure, but the exaggeration produces grotesque and bizarre image. The grotesque is
based primarily on the language, which is released from the traditional rules and is free to express the world around free complying the free will of the one who uses it. Moving the boundaries in imitation and unifying the contrasting elements the collection embodies at the same time one of the great themes of the Baroque: a game of illusion and reality, or truth and falsehood.
Key words: laughter, meraviglia, metaphore, rethinking, folk, aulic, impossible

pages 381-391

In  questo  contributo  ci  proponiamo  di  analizzare  il  motivo  del  personaggio  ridente  nella novellistica  tardomedioevale  e  rinascimentale,  inteso  come  una  strategia  narrativa dell’autore, ovvero come un intervento volontario e consapevole dell’autore destinato ad offrire  al  lettore/pubblico  l’espediente  interpretativo  per  la  giusta  comprensione  del narrato.  Partendo  dalla  prima  novella  boccacciana  di  Ser  Ciappelletto,  ormai  considerata programmatica sotto vari aspetti, nell’analisi diacronica saranno incluse altre novelle del Decameron, nonché quelle di Sacchetti, Salernitano, Bandello e Grazzini. L’analisi testuale includerà  il  confronto  delle  reazioni  di  due  pubblici,  uno  diegetico  e  altro  extradiegetico (ove  presente),  in  relazione  con  i  due  piani  narrativi.  Nel  breve  riassunto  delle considerazioni teoriche sulla poetica della novella, individueremo i principali concetti e le idee  dei  primi  teoretici  che  saranno  poi  collegati  con  la  prassi  narrativa  nella  prospettiva intertestuale.

BACKGROUND Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is the most common chronic gastrointestinal (GI) disorder. Patients with IBS usually suffer from anxiety and depression. A combination of psychological approaches and pharmacological treatments can be a significantly effective treatment for IBS. The main objective of the present study was to provide a therapeutic plan based on laughter yoga and anti-anxiety medication, employed for the very first time, and to determine the effectiveness of these treatments on the anxiety and GI symptoms of patients with IBS. METHODS In this randomized, controlled, clinical trial, the participants were 60 patients selected from those who referred to the GI clinic of Vali-asr Hospital (Birjand, Iran) during the study period (April 2017 to March 2017) and were diagnosed as having IBS based on ROME III criteria. The participants were randomly assigned to either the laughter yoga group, the anti-anxiety medication group, or the symptomatic treatment (control) gro...

This article will discuss conflict as a source of humour in the young adult novel Love or Death (1987) by Croatia's legendary author Ivan Kušan. In 1956 the first novel in the Koko series, The Mystery of Green Hill, was one of the publications that marked the beginning of Croatian modern children's literature. After the adventures in novels such as Koko and the Ghosts (1958) and The Mystery of the Stolen Painting (1972), in 1982 the character of Koko appears during the rebellion of various Kušan's characters in Terrible Cowboy (1982) and offers Kušan his own manuscript for revision, titled Love or Death. Raising the issue of authorship, authority and truth characteristic of metafictional practices, Love or Death is a novel in which the main protagonist Ratko Milić Koko assumes ownership of the narrative, whereas Kušan as the author is "demoted" to the role of a "proofreader", commenting, correcting and doodling with a red pen in the margins of Koko's text. Essentially, Love or Death retains the legacy of modernity and its markings in the context of Croatian writing for children, yet, the novel also contains visual deviations, word play, playfulness, irony, cross-genre writing, parody of literary "classics," hyperbolising, intertextuality, trivialising, character/authorial intrusion, mass media synchronicity, and dissolution of language in its standard form, characteristic of postmodern literary practices [Hranjec 2001]. Because of the authorial conflict, the novel is strongly intergenerational, placing the main protagonist on the threshold of adolescence, and its humour resulting from the power struggle between the authors of a different age and their respective discourse. Therefore, Kušan's prose delves into both direct and indirect types of humour arising from the generational gap, peer relations and issues of vulnerability. Furthermore, the author-against-"author" conflict undeniably highlights Kušan's status as the "father of modern children's detective novel" and the "master of Croatian language" (Stamać). Finally, as a surreal authorial battlefield, Love or Death paradoxically transcends generations, genres, and national borders, as well as reconciles various aspects of writings for children pertaining to their target audience, modernity and narrative structure, which is why it is a unique example of children's and young adult metafiction in Croatia and worldwide.

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

The author should restructure this statement "Chronic diseases are a significant public health issue globally and in Lebanon, where the economic situation exacerbates healthcare challenges" to convey better clarity as well as improved grammar The authors should structure the abstract into various sections to allow easy reading and understanding by the audience (e.g., background, aim, method, results, conclusion) Are the authors trying to categorize "laughter therapy and positive thinking" as an alternative therapy, just a therapy substitute to medications and other forms of management of chronic diseases, or is it just a coping mechanism/strategy, or just a complementary therapy to medications and other forms of management of chronic diseases? Clarification should be provided to the audience of this manuscript Methodology

In the midst of a sacralized society, the New Granada of the seventeenth century was a booming stage for colonial painting. With the provisions of the Counter-Reformation and Trent, European painting manuals, hagiographies and plates, all sacred representations were put under the inquisitive gaze of the Church, thus configuring a visual discourse centered on rhetoric and persuasion. Therefore, taking on the concept of device, coined by Foucault and furthered by Agamben, this article applies it to the way in which the Church used painting as a tool of indoctrination, more specifically as a proto-disciplining device of the social body, and centered said device in the dichotomous representation of laughter: on the one hand framed in duty, submission, temperance and the sacred, and on the other hand as a synthesis of practices to avoid, including the profane, vices and eternal condemnation.En medio de una sociedad sacralizada, la Nueva Granada del siglo XVII se constituyó como escenario...

This study examines Bektashi anecdotes in the context of relief theory, which is one of the theories of humour. The Bektashi anecdotes are analysed within the framework of the views of Sigmund Freud, the founder of modern psychology, who is one of the pioneers of relief theory and perhaps one of the leading proponents of this theory. Sigmund Freud sees humour as a safe expression of unconscious desires and conflicts. In other words, the anecdotes were treated with a Freudian approach and an attempt was made to uncover the psychological origins of humour, as well as the impact of social norms on the individual and the expression of this impact as an element of laughter. In this context, it was examined how the Bektashi anecdotes function by expressing the mental aberration of individuals as well as criticising and reshaping social norms. Since their beginnings (around the 14th century), Bektashi anecdotes have been a narrative genre in which social criticism is combined with humour and irony. In the light of Freud's theories on humour and the unconscious, it analyses what these anecdotes actually represent and what kind of relief they offer to the narrator and the listener. This book opens a door to understanding both the political and psychological substructure of humour and the Bektashi tradition, showing how humour provides illumination in the dark recesses of the human psyche.

Laughter is a marginal topic within educational research in general, as well as within philosophy of education in particular. Whenever this subject gets attention at all, it is commonly treated either as a didactic tool, the benefits or dangers of which are discussed in relation to efficient teaching, or as a dimension of corporeality, the absence of which is symptomatic of an (educational) culture that is marked by a deep aversion toward human embodiment.

Laughter is a marginal topic within educational research in general, as well as within philosophy of education in particular. Whenever this subject gets attention at all, it is commonly treated either as a didactic tool, the benefits or dangers of which are discussed in relation to efficient teaching, or as a dimension of corporeality, the absence of which is symptomatic of an (educational) culture that is marked by a deep aversion toward human embodiment.

In their monodies for the death of the sebastokrator Andronikos Komnenos in 1130, Michael Italikos and his pupil Theodore Prodromos included two different but equally moving ethopoiiai of the sea. Through an analysis of these texts, this chapter aims to study the sea theme as a source of inspiration for Byzantine writers in their funerary texts, such as epitaphs, monodies, and consolation speeches. It turns out that the writers used images, metaphors, and comparisons that refer to the marine world to vividly express the gloomy nature of death, and, more frequently, the intense sadness experienced by the bereaved or the authors themselves. Maritime themes, such as ships being tossed by waves, fragile ropes and halyards, lost anchors, perishing captains, horrible sea monsters devouring victims, an abundance of tears recalling the vastness of the sea, harbours full of wrecks, storms, and foaming waves, are commonplaces repeatedly encountered in this type of texts. Very rarely does the sea show its friendly
face. To paraphrase the title of a well-known play, “Μourning Becomes
the Sea”.

Many designs have been suggested for connecting absent loved ones using technology. This thesis focuses on a particular user group: 3-generation families, where some members are separated by a large distance. The aim of this study is to design a communication technology that allows people with family members living abroad to feel more connected. The work started with a Probe study triggering deep feelings about relationship and communication. The findings from the analysis of this qualitative data were examined again to generate ideas for design. The concept of TimelyPresent was inspired from one of the design ideas and developed into a working prototype.

Laughter is one of the most characteristic -and enigmatic-communicational traits of human individuals. Its analysis has to take into account a variety of emotional, social, cognitive, and communicational factors densely interconnected. In this article we study laughter just as an auditive signal (as a 'neutral' information carrier), and we compare its structure with the regular traits of linguistic signals. In the experimental records of human laughter that we have performed, the most noticeable trait is the disorder content of frequencies. In comparison with the sonograms of vowels, the information content of which appears as a characteristic, regular function of the first vibration modes of the dynamic system formed, for each vowel, by the vocal cords and the accompanying resonance of the vocalization apparatus, the sonograms of laughter are highly irregular. In the episodes of laughter, a highly random content in frequencies appears, reason why it cannot be considered as a genuine codification of patterned information like in linguistic signals. In order to numerically gauge the disorder content of laughter frequencies, we have performed several "entropy" measures of the spectra -trying to unambiguously identify spontaneous laughter from "faked", articulated laughter. Interestingly, Shannon's entropy (the most natural candidate) performs rather poorly.

The current study examines whether the fear of being laughed at (gelotophobia) can be assessed reliably and validly by means of a self-report instrument in different countries of the world. All items of the GELOPH (Ruch and Titze, GELOPH〈46〉, University of Düsseldorf, 1998; Ruch and Proyer, Swiss Journal of Psychology 67:19–27, 2008b) were translated to the local language of the collaborator (42 languages in total). In total, 22,610 participants in 93 samples from 73 countries completed the GELOPH. Across all samples the reliability of the 15-item questionnaire was high (mean alpha of .85) and in all samples the scales appeared to be unidimensional. The endorsement rates for the items ranged from 1.31% through 80.00% to a single item. Variations in the mean scores of the items were more strongly related to the culture in a country and not to the language in which the data were collected. This was also supported by a multidimensional scaling analysis with standardized mean scores of ...

This paper examines the transformational features and usage of “winged phrases” – in this case quotations from Soviet films that have become catchphrases in spoken and written Russian – in the headings of articles from three Russian newspapers. Data were selected between 2017 and 2018 from Komsomol′skaia pravda (Moscow edition), Izvestiia, and Literaturnaia gazeta. First, the authors identify the transformational features of these phrases; second, they analyze the nature of their usage, drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism. The study reveals two new types of transformations (grammatically associative and lexical) that have not been identified in previous literature. It also demonstrates how the prism of dialogism affords new insights into the socio-historical and multi-voiced richness of winged phrases, extending our understanding of the complex plasticity of the structural and heteroglossic features of these phrases over time.

Cet article examine les caractéristiques transformationnelles et l’utilisation de « phrases ailées » – en l’occurrence des citations de films soviétiques qui sont devenues des expressions consacrées dans le russe parlé et écrit – dans les titres d’articles de trois journaux russes. Le matériau a été rassemblé entre 2017 et 2018 dans les journaux Komsomol′skaâ pravda (édition de Moscou), Izvestiâ et Literaturnaâ gazeta. Dans un premier temps, les auteures identifient les caractéristiques transformationnelles de ces phrases; dans un second temps, elles analysent leur usage, en s’appuyant sur la théorie du dialogisme de Mikhaïl Bakhtine. L’étude révèle deux nouveaux types de transformations (grammaticalement associatives et lexicales) qui n’ont pas été identifiés dans la littérature antérieure. Elle démontre également que le prisme du dialogisme offre de nouvelles perspectives sur la richesse socio-historique et multi-vocale des phrases ailées, élargissant notre compréhension de la plasticité complexe des caractéristiques structurelles et hétéroglossiques de ces phrases au fil du temps.

In this article, we have chosen to observe the functioning of citational practices through the analysis of a corpus of articles published in satirical newspapers written in French and Romanian. In fact, satirical discourse most often presents uses of quotation sometimes considered "deviant" in the sense that it subverts the norms: the role attributed to direct discourse is different, the sources cited are chosen and named according to particular criteria, the methods of inserting the quoted discourse into the quoting discourse transgress usual practices. In the articles taken into consideration, the purpose of this diversion is the triggering of laughter through the degradation, the distortion of reality. Our analysis will examine the sources of laughter through the nuanced observation of the uses of citational practices identified in the corpus, in an equally comparative and complementary approach.

Cet article traite de l’utilisation des Écritures juives par le Nouveau Testament. L’un des aspects de cette utilisation passe par l’humour. Ceci correspond à l’histoire de la recherche qui aujourd’hui se consacre aux études sur l’humour dans l’Antiquité, mettant en relief ce que certains auteurs anciens offrent à leurs auditeurs: le rire occasionnel. Ce sont des échos de la littérature juive dans le Nouveau Testament qui, selon l’argument développé ici, contribuent à ces traits humoristiques. Même si la question de savoir s’ils y ont réussi dépasse le cadre de cet article, nous défendons l’idée que certains jeux sur les mots tirés des sources juives suscitent le rire, ce qui est évident dans les modèles de l’humour que nous identifions dans ces textes. Selon nous, la culture littéraire du Nouveau Testament est assurément marquée par un certain penchant pour l’humour.

Presentamos el que, no sin polémica, se ha descrito como “primer tratado chino de retórica”: el «Guiguzi». Se trata de un texto inédito en castellano, atribuido a un pensador y educador cuya vida se sitúa a mediados del siglo IV a. C., en la fase final del clasicismo chino (Reinos Combatientes). Hasta recientemente, el texto ha sido marginado, considerado peligroso y excluido tradicionalmente de las colecciones canónicas. Su idea de eficacia retórica ha sido asociada con la de “manipulación” por sinólogos como François Jullien, quien ha hablado también de “anti-retórica” para describirlo. Sus particularidades, como el énfasis en la escucha y en la penetración psicológica, pueden muy bien comprenderse en el contexto defensivo derivado del peligro físico en que se encuentra el suasor en la China clásica. Para contribuir a su conocimiento, aportamos aquí nuestra
traducción del capítulo 9.

L’une des caractéristiques de la culture postmoderne tient à l’articulation a priori paradoxale de la réflexivité et de la mise à distance ironique, permettant un travail de sape des hiérarchies traditionnelles et d’institutions coercitives dont la légitimité est remise en question. Les différents espaces interactifs de la culture web favorisent la mise en place de ces logiques contestataires, qui peuvent endosser une portée nihiliste, mais s’autorisent aussi à ériger des cultes alternatifs, versant volontiers dans l’absurde. La présente contribution vise à mettre en lumière les spécificités du rire sur l’internet 2.0 en termes de formes et de mécanismes (capsules de youtubeurs, mèmes, logiques communautaires, journaux parodiques, trolling, etc.).

This thesis consists of a creative component, a novel, Death’s laughter and an exegetical essay, Crafting a novel. The novel centres on a true Nigerian story: a Pentecostal pastor, who died in a plane crash, was a government official found out to have amassed large sums of money and assets that were far greater than could be accrued from his

Summary: Purpose: To describe the etiology, characteristics, and clinical evolution of epilepsy in patients with gelastic seizures (GSs). Methods: Nine patients whose seizures were characterized by typical laughing attacks were observed between 1986 and 1997. Patients were selected based on electroencephalogram (EEG) or video‐EEG recordings of at least one GS and on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study. Results: Five patients were affected by symptomatic localization‐related epilepsy (LRE), with four of the patients' disorders related to a hypothalamic hamartoma (HH) and one to tuberous sclerosis (TS) without evident hypothalamic lesions. In four patients (the cryptogenic cases) MRI was negative also in these cases, clinical and EEG data suggested a focal origin of the seizures. The epileptic syndrome in the HH cases was usually drug‐resistant, and was surgically treated in two of the patients. The patient with TS became seizure free with vigabatrin. In the cryptogenic cases, ...

Introduction: Sleep disorders affecting 40 to 70% of older adults manifest sleep disorders. Compromised sleep detrimentally impacts older adults, leading to daytime sleepiness, heightened fall risks, and cognitive decline. Demonstrates promising therapy in enhancing sleep quality and reducing fatigue through laughter therapy cards. Objective: The study aimed to construct and test the effect of laughter cards on improving the sleep quality of old adults in Lubuklinggau City, South Sumatra, Indonesia. Method: This quantitative study was conducted with a quasi-experimental approach. A total of 32 participants took part in this study, of which 32 participants attended laughter therapies with laughter therapy cards in 1 month by doing activities in laughter therapy four times in 1 month, each 45 minutes, before and after laughter therapies are assessed by PSQI score. The Cronbach's alpha coefficients used were 0.81. The paired t-test was used to determine the data statistically. Result: Before and after therapies showed different values of PSQI score. PSQI score of older adults before treatments (10.50), became (7.68) after therapies, and had a statistically significant p 0.001. Recommendation: Continuous laughter therapies are non-pharmacological therapy for older adults with a sleep disorder.

This study aims to think about the relation between laughter and politics. In the midst of this love-hate battle, we all understand Humor as a complex subject with various derivations that inhabits the present moment in a gracious state. From movies to television, from Arts to Politics, being funny and having a sense of humor are a key factor to understand the historical momentum. Addressing specifically the event White House Correspondents' Dinner we aim to explore the phenomenological and political implications of this exemplary case-study. This means trying to understand the importance of having politicians laughing at themselves, among them and at each other, by them and by others. This sui generis event, anchored in both and simultaneous offense and defense rhetorical strategies, is undoubtedly one of the most incongruous and relevant events in the political order worldwide. We hope to highlight that singularity in this special cooking of comedy in the heart of the American...

In what ways can Shakespeare be understood as grotesque? In popular usage,
the term “grotesque” combines a description of styler and content as well as a
feeling of confusion or disgust: it is both epistemology and phenomenology.
There is also a modern critical tradition of reading Shakespearean drama as
grotesque, which includes Victor Hugo, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Jan Kott. In
addition, contemporary critics have suggested that the grotesque is a significant
contemporary aesthetic, frequently related to horror. This essay explores the
meaning of the grotesque in Shakespeare by considering the examples of Titus
Andronicus and Macbeth. Both tragedies explore themes of violence, fear and
excess that verge on horror, and yet they also demonstrate some of the issues of
the grotesque at the level of literary form, performance history and audience
reception. Drawing on modern performance reviews and criticism, the essay
suggests that the critical reception of both plays might be better understood as
an example of the grotesque mode at work in Shakespeare studies. It will also
suggest how the metaphor of the “swelling of the imperial theme” in Macbeth
relates directly to the imagery of swelling in the work of Thomas Nashe and
how this might suggest another way to understand an early-modern grotesque.
The essay reflects on the implications of the grotesque in Shakespeare as it
relates to notions of proximity and distance in literary studies.

La pratique de l'adaptation est un phénomène ancien qui correspond à une réalité culturelle d'une grande diversité, sous la forme de pratiques de réécritures multiples et d'artefacts sémiotiques non moins nombreux. Les recherches consacrées aux phénomènes adaptatifs se sont longtemps intéressées à la dimension littéraire de l'adaptation et ce n'est que depuis quelques années que sont apparues des propositions théoriques susceptibles de décrire, d'un point de vue essentiellement sémiologique, les processus et les opérations qui caractérisent les adaptations. Nous voudrions ici rendre compte, sous la forme d'une revue de questions, de l'état de ces théories, en privilégiant les adaptations de romans au théâtre. Nous examinerons successivement, outre un précurseur formaliste tel que Cailhava de l'Estendoux, les modèles proposés par Gérard Genette, Gérard-Denis Farcy ou encore Muriel Plana. Ils sont à prendre comme autant d'outils d'analyse censés objectiver une pratique créatrice qui ne cesse de se développer.

Représenter le sacré dans le monde grec COLOMBE COUËLLE Au milieu d'un frais bosquet de myrtes, de fraîches jeunes filles chantent Aphrodite éléphantine. Le choeur est dirigé par une femme d'expérience…Aphrodite est pudique, nue, dans une attitude décente : c'est une statue d'ivoire formée de petits blocs rapprochés. Mais la déesse ne veut pas que l'on croie à une peinture ; elle se détache en relief et semble offrir prise à la main. Veux-tu que sur son autel nous fassions une libation en paroles ? (Philostrate, La galerie de tableaux, Livre II, 1). A l'aide d'un petit corpus d'images, représentées sur des vases grecs, réalisées aux VI e et V e siècles av. J.-C., à Athènes et au V e siècle, en milieu colonial d'Italie méridionale, j'aimerai évoquer quelques problèmes de lecture concernant le sacré. La notion de sacré, to hieron, est en elle-même difficile à définir car elle implique, non seulement un rapport de l'homme au divin, mais encore un ensemble de croyances, de rites et de comportements pour entrer en contact avec le monde complexe des dieux. J. Rudhardt a posé la question en ces termes : Comment identifier le religieux dans la vie d'un peuple dont la foi nous est incommunicable, comment y distinguer dans l'ensemble des faits de civilisation ceux qui appartiennent à la religion et ceux qui lui demeurent étrangers ? 1 . En effet, dans cette religion sans livre de référence, sans dogmes, sans clergé constitué, sans divinité transcendantale, et, de surcroît, polythéiste, l'historien se trouve confronté à un ensemble d'interrogations, souvent demeurées sans réponses. Il ne s'agira pas de répéter ici l'ensemble des recherches et des théories énoncées sur la religion grecque, au sein de la cité, au moment de sa structuration, vers la fin du IX e siècle av. J.-C. Je me contenterai de poser quelques jalons 1 Notions fondamentales de la pensée religieuse et actes constitutifs du culte en Grèce classique (2 e éd), Paris, Picard, 1992, p. 11.

In analogy to the appreciation of humor, that of tickling is based upon the re-interpretation of an anticipated emotional situation. Hence, the anticipation of tickling contributes to the final outburst of ticklish laughter. To localize the neuronal substrates of this process, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was conducted on 31 healthy volunteers. The state of anticipation was simulated by generating an uncertainty respecting the onset of manual foot tickling. Anticipation was characterized by an augmented fMRI signal in the anterior insula, the hypothalamus, the nucleus accumbens and the ventral tegmental area, as well as by an attenuated one in the internal globus pallidus. Furthermore, anticipatory activity in the anterior insula correlated positively with the degree of laughter that was produced during tickling. These findings are consistent with an encoding of the expected emotional consequences of tickling and suggest that early regulatory mechanisms inf luence, automatically, the laughter circuitry at the level of affective and sensory processing. Tickling activated not only those regions of the brain that were involved during anticipation, but also the posterior insula, the anterior cingulate cortex and the periaqueductal gray matter. Sequential or combined anticipatory and tickling-related neuronal activities may adjust emotional and sensorimotor pathways in preparation for the impending laughter response.

Autour de l’année 1170, le dialogue entre les deux troubadours Giraut de Borneill et Raimbaut d’Aurenga apparaît décisif dans l’élaboration d’une théorie du style qui remet en question les présupposés formels et idéologiques du trobar hermétique marcabrunien. Diffé- rentes pièces attribuables aux troubadours mentionnés s’agrègent autour du thème de la per- tinence de l’expression du sentiment ou, au contraire, de son masquage sous des vêtements formels difficiles avec l’insertion d’éléments allusifs qui renvoient à la poétique de Marcabru ou de Peire d’Alvernhe. Un cas d’étude particulièrement intéressant est donné, par exemple, par l’image de la bouche comme symbole du mot poétique, dans les lemmes (assez rares dans le corpus) cays (‘bocca’) et dens (‘dents’). La référence fait en effet partie d’un répertoire d’ex- pressions marquées qui conduisent à la réflexion sur le trobar clus et le sens de l’extériorisation (ou, inversement, de la dissimulation) du mot. Raimbaut d’Aurenga se place au centre de ce «tarabiscotage» en raison de sa haute noblesse et de sa position sociale et du fait qu’il repré- sente le centre d’un échange qui a aussi une importance historique. À partir de ces cordonnées, le but de l’article est d’extrapoler des considérations méthodologiques utile à l’approche (cri- tique et philologique) des rappels allusifs dans le corpus troubadouresque et sur le rapport entre textes et circonstances historiques. La valorisation de l’intertextualité chez les trou- badours de la génération centrale a d’ailleurs pour but de garantir, par l’identification des vecteurs dialogiques, une appréciation plus profonde des textes, ainsi qu’une lecture plus consciente et raffinée des références formelles d’une période cruciale de l’histoire du trobar.

In this essay, written in 2013 for online circulation, I set out some political questions of interpreting art, drawing on Susan Hiller's definitions of a primary and a secondary audience, and make some claim for the agency of latent communities of understanding. Alison Jones's use of painting is shown to produce bewildered recognition and an effective use of blatancy, Amanda Beech's video work is shown to be alert to the emergence of didactic online lectures and authoritative modes of speaking and narrating as contemporary capitalist form. The approach to the art I discuss is experimental, and aims to demonstrate clearly how I reach my understandings from these contrasting aesthetic strategies. Both Jones and Beech are shown to achieve a meaningful connection with urgent contemporary questions: the repositioning of feminism and laughter in painting, and the mobilisation of the viewer's wish to argue back to the screen and to understand how its authority is produced. ...

La  religion musulmane dans son courant majoritaire, le sunnisme, puise ses croyances et ses pratiques à deux sources scripturaires principales : le Coran et la Sunna ou tradition prophétique, constituée de dizaines de milliers de hadiths ou récits retraçant les dires et les faits et gestes attribués au Prophète et/ou à ses compagnons.Le présent article s’interrogera sur ce que disent les hadiths de deux aspects de la corporalité et de l’émotivité de deux catégories de créatures décrites dans ces textes que sont les anges et les démons : le rire et les pleurs. En tant que manifestations corporelles, sonores ou visuelles, ces deux actions de rire et de pleurer permettent d’explorer le champ, si peu étudié, des émotions et de leurs expressions physiques chez des créatures aux corps très différents de ceux de l’espèce humaine.

SYNOPSIS A patient is reported with episodes of epileptic laughter, crying, and running occurring alone or in combination. He was found to have a discrete, well-circumscribed tumour of the left temporal lobe. The neurology of these epileptic events is discussed in relation to the pathological lesion. Laughter as an epileptic phenomenon is extremely uncommon and equally so is episodic running. The combination of these two forms of epilepsy-'gelastic' (laughter) and 'cursive' (running)-in the same individual is rare. There are only two earlier reports, of in all, three cases (Sisler et al., 1953; Chen and Forster, 1973). All these cases resulted from diffuse cerebral disorder. We studied an individual with such episodic events of laughter, running and also crying occurring alone or in combination, associated with a discrete neoplastic lesion in the left temporal lobe. This case permits appraisal of cerebral localization of 'centres' for the physical expression of emotions. Crying as an ictal event has not received much attention in the literature. We coin the word 'quiritarian' epilepsy (quiritare: Latin: to cry/scream) to indicate this phenomenon. A 33 year old infantry soldier was evacuated to our neurological centre with a history of episodic seizures for one and a half years. He was observed to have four to six seizures a day, lasting 0.5-1.0 minute. In some of these episodes he would burst into crying, while in others into laughter and sometimes there was a curious mixture of both. The laughter did not have an infectious quality. He was later observed to have, in addition, episodes of running.

El texto Corporalidad y educación desde el posthu-
manismo, coordinado por Fernando Torres García
y Alfonso Luna Martínez, se deriva del conjunto de
ponencias presentadas por el grupo de trabajo “La
corporalidad en el campo de la educación (física y
especial) desde el Posthumanismo” en el X Congre-
so Internacional de Ciencias, Artes y Humanidades.
Corporalidades desde el posthumanismo. Subjetivi-
dades, prácticas, representaciones, realizado del 22
al 25 de octubre de 2024 en las instalaciones de la
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (UAM), cam-
pus Xochimilco, organizado a su vez por la Dra. Elsa
Muñiz.

Exposure to laughter has striking effects on human listeners and may facilitate positive emotional and behavioural responses. The acoustic signal pattern of laughter vocalisations is particularly suitable to elicit these reactions. However, little is known about factors that lead to differences in reactions of listeners. The acousuc quality of laughter, the social context, and the disposition of the listener are possible variables in dzerences in evaluation. W e conducted experiments using playback techniques in which human laughter elicited in a natural setting was evaluated by listeners (N=90). Listeners evaluated several phrases of laughter produced by dfierent laughing targets. We investigated the role of the characteristics of voice, dynamic-acoustic characteristics, and order of playback sequence on the evaluation of laughter. The dynamic-acoustic characteristics of laughter significantly affected evaluations by listeners, whereas voice and the playback order did not. An acoustic analysis allowed us to identify acoustic parameters that contribute to such daerences in evaluation.

P.P.Grzybowski, Śmiech życia i śmierci. Od osobistych historii po edukację do pamięci o okupacji, gettach i obozach koncentracyjnych, Oficyna Wydawnicza „Impuls”, wydanie 2 nowe - poprawione i rozszerzone, Kraków 2025, 291 s., ISBN 978-83-8294-399-3.
W książce zostały opisane okoliczności występowania zjawiska śmiechu w czasach kryzysu społecznego związanego z wojną i okupacją. Dzięki wspomnieniom i świadectwom uczestników dramatycznych wydarzeń w okupowanej Polsce, gettach i obozach koncentracyjnych, oraz wyborowi utworów komicznych z czasów wojny i okupacji, czytelnik zorientuje się, jak istotną funkcję pełnił śmiech jako czynnik m.in. oporu, poprawiania jakości życia i kształtowania wspólnoty.
Autor przedstawia przykłady aktywności tzw. ludzi śmiechu podczas drugiej wojny światowej, w ramach twórczości kulturalnej, działalności konspiracyjnej, w folklorze ulicy oraz fragmenty historii osób zarówno znanych z kultury masowej (Adam Grzymała-Siedlecki, Marian Hemar, Anna Jachnina, Jerzy Jurandot, Aleksander Kamiński, Szymon Kobyliński, Janusz Korczak, Antoni Kroh, Kazimierz Krukowski, Bożena Krzywobłocka, Eryk Lipiński, Antoni Marianowicz, Marian Walentynowicz, Władysław Szpilman, Mira Zimińska-Sygietyńska i in.), mało znanych, jak i anonimowych, które rozśmieszając i śmiejąc się z innymi pomagały innym przetrwać wojnę i okupację.
Książka ta może zainteresować osoby pasjonujące się historią drugiej wojny światowej i Holokaustu w ujęciu międzykulturowym, zajmujące się edukacją historyczną związaną z miejscami pamięci narodowej, a także terapią śmiechem realizowaną z ofiarami kryzysów społecznych.

html Le numéro 29 de Synergie Algérie intitulé « Écritures humanistes, scientifiques et en devenir » offre une vue sur les études émergentes susceptibles de fournir une contribution significative à la thématique de l'écriture en tant que véhicule du savoir littéraire et scientifique. Ce présent numéro se divise en cinq parties qui touchent des aspects hétéroclites : Écriture féminine, Poétique de la violence et Postmodernité, Écritures transtextuelles et Poétique de l'imaginaire, Écritures médicales, murales, numériques : Optiques linguistiques et socioculturelles, Écritures phonétiques, touristiques, humoristiques : Contrastes entre les languescultures française et arabe et Écritures didactiques et didactique de l'écriture : Compétences enseignantes-apprenantes. L'écriture, dans tous ces aspects, participe dans la préservation culturelle en tant qu'outil de conservation des traditions, des coutumes et des croyances. En transcendant les frontières géographiques et linguistiques, les écrits favorisent le dialogue interculturel et assurent la transmission du patrimoine, tout en contribuant à la compréhension mutuelle, à l'enrichissement des différentes sociétés et à l'accès aux connaissances et à l'imaginaire d'une communauté. Ces réalités nous invitent donc à réfléchir à la valeur intrinsèque de l'écriture et à sa contribution dans notre quête incessante de compréhension du monde. En adoptant une classification thématique, il est envisageable d'obtenir une perspective globale à travers un compte rendu qui ne prétend pas être exhaustif. Les sujets d'étude axés sur l'Écriture féminine, la Poétique de la violence et la Postmodernité suscitent un intérêt considérable dans le domaine de la recherche littéraire. Dans ce contexte, l'écriture possède un grand pouvoir puisqu'elle engage à la fois la raison et l'émotion, ralliant ainsi nos sens simultanément. Son rôle

In recent years, many readers and commentators have attempted to reconstruct Kant's critical system in architectonic or systematic ways. To this end, many have incorporated pre-Critical works while others have argued that any published or unpublished work written after 1781 belongs to the critical system. Lara Ostaric, however, asserts that the third Critique represents the end-in all senses of that word-of the critical project, for "it does not culminate in empirical cognition of the natural world but, rather, in reason's 'highest' or 'final end' (KrV, A840/B8868). .. namely, morality" (2). She offers a bold and ambitious claim and one that I think she achieves. The whole problem that she sets off to resolve, for Kant, is the alleged "gulf" between nature and freedom.

Based on 495 minutes of audio-and video-recorded data from television variety shows, this paper intends to illustrate and discuss the pragmatic/interpersonal functions of laughter and smiling from an interactional linguistic perspective. Laughter and smiling are not only expressions of emotion or subconscious responses to stimuli (

For permission to incorporate adapted portions of an essay first appearing in Early American Literature (volume 10, 1975) into my fourth chapter, I am grateful to the current publishers of that journal. Thomas Gibbs of the Redwood Athenaeum in Newport, Rhode Island, allowed me to cite a brief passage from Edward Taylors unpublished "Theological Notes" manuscript. And like other students of Taylor, I have benefited from the use of Gene Russell's Concordance to the Poems of Edward Taylor (Microcard Editions, 1973) and am pleased to acknowledge here this otherwise unspoken debt. There are several whom I wish ,to thank more personally for diverse gifts of advice and assistance with the manuscript.