Discourse pervades all areas of human activity. Beyond the use of verbal communication, discourse also extends to non-verbal elements such as body language, facial expressions, intonation and laughter. Despite the wide range of studies that examine the structures and nature of political discourse, very few have looked at the ways in which politicians use non-verbal elements and, in particular, laughter as part of their discourse strategies. This study looks at the use of laughter in the German Bundestag by analysing 16,000 observations of laughter taken from the transcripts of 847 plenary sessions spanning four electoral terms. The study finds that laughter can be used by politicians as a non-verbal means of expressing opinion and making a statement without breaking the stringent rules of conduct. The use of laughter in parliament can provide information on party alliances, both current and traditional, as well as the general ‘mood’ of the electoral period. Due to the changing nature of political debates and the increasing rejection of ‘traditional’ means of doing politics, fascinating changes are taking place in the political landscape.:1 Introduction 2 Discourse analysis 2.1 Political discourse analysis 2.2 Parliamentary debates 2.2.1 According to Klein 2.2.2 Parliamentary discourse as monologue, dialogue or trialogue? 2.2.3 Interjections as parliamentary discourse 2.3 Non-verbal communication 3 Humour 3.1 Humour in politics 3.2 The study of humour in politics 4 Background 4.1 The German Bundestag 4.2 Stenographic reports 4.2.1 Written or spoken language? 4.2.2 The difference between Lachen and Heiterkeit 4.3 Electoral term specifics 5 Data 5.1 Hypotheses 5.2 Description of the analysis 6 Results 7 Discussion 7.1 Reflections 7.2 Outlook 8 Conclusion References

Abstract The American president’s serving period always begin with an iconic inaugural address. It is a function wherein the president can unify the audience, ratify the ceremony, and present his political and administrative direction for his term. Promises are a vital rhetorical tool and strategy at the president’s disposal; however, they can also be a demerit if used incorrectly. Within the discipline of pragmatics, promises are included in the category of the commissive speech act: an utterance which binds the speaker to a future course of action. The focus of the present study is what proportion commissive speech acts are used in relation to other speech acts by the four American presidents inaugurated in the 21st century in their inaugural addresses, as well as how these commissive speech acts are realized in terms of various pragmatic features (e.g., vagueness, deictic use, selfpositive representation, and implicature). The methodological approach adopted in thisstudy is both qualitative as well as quantitative in character. To reflect this, the study was operationalized through speech act analysis and political discourse analysis. The findingsshowcase that the presidents affiliated with the Republican party make use of commissive speech acts to a higher degree than their Democratic counterparts. Donald J. Trump appears as a clear outlier with an exuberant amount of commissive speech acts in comparison with the other three presidents. Furthermore, the findings point out that the most common strategy in how commissive speech acts were realised was to shape them as an assertion and using the inclusive deixis “we”. However, Joseph R. Biden diverged from this pattern. Instead, he used explicit promises featuring the individual deixis “I”. In addition, he often employed rhetorical vagueness which made his promises hard to measure if upheld or not.

In February 1914, Sweden faced a time of constitutional crisis, dubbed the Courtyard Crisis, when King Gustaf V publicly distanced himself from Prime Minister Karl Staaff and the Liberal Government over differences of opinion regarding the Swedish defence. Behind this, however, was also a dispute between two different political systems. On the one hand, there was the current form of government based on monarchical rule, and on the other hand, the advancing form of government, a government based on parliamentarism. This thesis is concerned with explaining the tension that arises between, on the one hand, different forms of government, and, on the other hand, aspects of decision making in the process of securitisation. To do this, the thesis uses Buzan, Wæver, and de Wilde’s securitisation sectors, though limited to the military, political, and societal sectors, as entry points for the analysis and uses political discourse analysis to analyse the language used by the Left and the Right during parliamentary debates held between 6 and 18 February 1914. The thesis concludes that, though the results were not conclusive, the Courtyard Crisis can be used as an example to explain the tension between different forms of government by showing the difference in ideas between the two powers of state in Sweden and how these affect the decision making in the process of securitisation.