https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501514685-010 Ellen Hurst-Harosh and Nico Nassenstein 8 On conversational humour in South African and Congolese youth’s interactions: A pragmatic approach to youth language Youth languages have been treated as a mostly sociolinguistic phenomenon, while the present chapter turns the focus to pragmatic approaches. The pragmatics of humour often circle around the three theoretical concepts “incongruity”, “superi- ority” (grounded in sociological theory), and “relief” (according to psychoanalyti- cal theory) (Dynel 2013b: vii) with an emphasis on the incongruity approach. Besides the study of jokes, humour has increasingly been investigated in its manifold conversational contexts, or as part of language in interaction across different dis- course domains – however, mostly without taking young speakers’ language prac- tices into account. This chapter analyses humour in interaction in African youth languages by specifically looking at conversational storytelling in South Africa (focusing on Tsotsitaal/isiTsotsi speakers), and by looking at humorous anecdotes as practice of joint reminiscing in DR Congo (by speakers of Lingala ya Bayankee/ Yanké). The suggested “pragmatic turn” in the study of African youth languages is based on the analysis of structural aspects of conversational humour, its stylisation and transgressive function. The chapter offers an outlook onto the study of humour as a new and relevant field of study not only for African youth’s performances and interactions but also as a promising component in more global approaches. 1 Introduction to (youth) language and humour Research on humour in language ¹ has yielded a vast number of relevant publi- cations over the past two decades, with different foci and manifold theoretical research questions. However, the attempt to define the actual nature of humour 1 We are considerably grateful to all research assistants and interlocutors who assisted during fieldwork in DR Congo and South Africa. The anonymous reviewers are warmly thanked for their ideas and support. Ellen Hurst-Harosh, University of Cape Town, e-mail: ellen.hurst@uct.ac.za Nico Nassenstein, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, e-mail: nassenstein@uni-mainz.de