kinesics

The study of visual body language as communication. Kinesics is concerned partly with the conventional movements and gestures that convey deliberate messages, and also with the way facial expressions, body movements, and posture provide patterns of involuntary clues to the emotional state of the person observed, and to the nature of social interaction. It particularly studies the way winks, eyebrow movements, smiles, waving, finger gestures, and other movements of the face and limbs vary in meaning between different cultures.

Kinesics is the interpretation of body language such as facial expressions and gestures — or, more formally, non-verbal behaviour related to movement, either of any part of the body or the body as a whole.

The term was first used (in 1952) by Ray Birdwhistell, a ballet dancer turned anthropologist who wished to study how people communicate through posture, gesture, stance, and movement.

Drawing heavily on descriptive linguistics, Birdwhistell argued that all movements of the body have meaning (ie.

Birdwhistell estimated that "no more than 30 to 35 percent of the social meaning of a conversation or an interaction is carried by the words."

A few Birdwhistell-isms are as follows:

Social personality is a temporo-spatial system. Even if no participant of an interaction field can recall, or repeat in a dramatized context, a given series or sequence of body motions, the appearance of a motion is of significance to the general study of the particular kinesic system even if the given problem can be rationalized without reference to it. All meaningful body motion patterns are to be regarded as socially learned until empirical investigation reveals otherwise. Some related words may be:

Emblems a substitute for words and phrases Illustrators accompany or reinforce verbal messages Affect Displays Show emotion Regulators Control the flow and pace of communication Adaptors Release physical or emotional tension

Kinesics are an important part of non-verbal communication behavior. The movement of the body, or separate parts, conveys many specific meanings and the interpretations may be culture bound. As many movements are carried out at a subconscious or at least a low-awareness level, kinesic movements carry a significant risk of being misinterpreted in an intercultural communications situation.