Banter 'can cross religious divide'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/7595839.stm

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Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness enjoyed a joke in the workplace

Friendly banter about Northern Ireland's religious divide should be encouraged in the workplace, according to a University of Ulster study.

The report said it found light-hearted ribbing among co-workers about their respective community backgrounds is a good way to form relationships.

It recommended that those organisations which actively discourage jokes about perceived differences between Protestant and Catholics should reconsider.

Professor Owen Hargie, one of the authors of the Learning To Deal With Difference report, said: "Our research revealed that banter, which included references to one's community background, was a potentially very useful communication practice in many organisations, in facilitating and easing relationships.

"However, interestingly, some organisations actively prohibit banter."

The academics interviewed a total of 81 workers in 10 organisations in Belfast about their attitude to banter.

They study focused on employees who came from interface areas where Protestant and Catholic neighbourhoods sit next to each other.

The authors said that companies had the potential to make a real difference to promoting peace and reconciliation in the region, given that the workplace was one of the few arenas where people from different backgrounds interact regularly.