Cachinnation

- loud or immoderate laughter

- what you do when you laugh loudly, guffaw, or cackle, and probably embarrass or annoy everyone around you

-  inappropriate laughter, sometimes found in schizophrenia (psychiatry)

Merriam-Webster / Vocabulary(dot)com / Collins Dictionary

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WORD ORIGIN

Cachinnate has been whooping it up in English since the 19th century. The word derives from the Latin verb cachinnare, meaning "to guffaw or laugh loudly”, and cachinnare was probably coined in imitation of a loud laugh.

Our words giggle and guffaw, although unrelated to those above (and to each other), are believed to have been modelled after the sound of laughter.

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THE GIGGLE CODE

1. No Joke
Laughter is not primarily about jokes, we are far more likely to laugh in general conversation than when hearing a joke — only about 10% of our laughter episodes are generated by jokes.

2. Brain function
Your brain can distinguish between genuine and staged laughter, with staged laughter activating the anterior medial prefrontal cortex.

3. Dating
Mentioning a sense of humour is more common in personal ads than intelligence, education, profession, or sexual drive.

4. Other mammals
Gorillas and rats exhibit laughter-like vocalizations during play and when tickled.

5. Hardwired from birth
Babies as young as 17 days old have been observed laughing, and children born blind and deaf can still laugh. Infants can elicit giggles from their parents by making funny faces, using funny voices, or playing peekaboo.

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SYNONYMS

- synonyms for “laughter”

affectionate (boisterous, bright, bubbly, cheerful, effervescent, exuberant, hearty, infectious, joyous, light-hearted, merry, peals of, spirited, spontaneous, warm) laughter, belly laugh, busting a gut, CACHINNATION, chortle, chuckle, creased up, giggle, guffaw, hilarity, howl, in hysterics (stitches), laughing fit, laughing like a drain, maniacal laughter, mirth, roar, snickering, sniggering, side splitting, tittering, whooping

onomatopoeias = muwhahaha, muahahaha, bwahahaha, hahaha, hohoho, hee hee, tee hee

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SMUGGLE OWAD into a witty English sentence this weekend, say or write something like:

“The wedding guests erupted in a cacophony of CACHINNATION as the best man's speech veered into the realm of the utterly inappropriate.”

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