@article{Kanchanapoomi_Trakulkasemsuk_2020, title={Laughter: A Communication Strategy in Business Meeting between Thai and Burmese Professionals}, volume={27}, url={https://so05.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/reflections/article/view/241721}, DOI={10.61508/refl.v27i1.241721}, abstractNote={<p>Laughter is a common feature found in daily conversations as an element showing amusement. However, laughter can also appear in serious talk such as business meetings (Murata, 2007; Markaki, et al., 2010). This paper scrutinizes laughter use between Thai and Burmese participants in a business meeting held in Yangon, Myanmar, and examines laughter functions and factors stimulating laughter to occur. The business meeting data was collected using the ethnographic method - a participant observation, extensive field notes, interviews and audio recordings. The data were analyzed based on the framework of laughter adapted from Hayakawa (2003) and Murata & Hori (2007); the findings reveal that laughter was used as a communication strategy and occurred in the meeting both in a relaxed atmosphere and in a serious discussion with different intentions - to have fun, to make fun of work, to ease the tension and to threaten other interlocutors.</p>}, number={1}, journal={rEFLections}, author={Kanchanapoomi, Tabtip and Trakulkasemsuk, Wannapa}, year={2020}, month={Apr.}, pages={22–43} }