Sunday, November 16, 2008

20 - Unnecessary hand gestures

This kind of ties in with the post about staying still in class. What prompted me to talk about this was somebody asking me for the time the other day and the person felt the need to tap his wrist twice with two fingers to indicate that the wrist is where people usually wear watches, wristwatches used to tell time. Oh, as much as I appreciate that reminder, it's a sheer waste of my brainpower having to follow the movement of his fingers when words are all one needs to express oneself.

I think this way about any gestures. It's just distracting when you constantly wave your hands left, right, front and back, up, down and around when you're telling a story. I think this especially about narratives and reenactments that incorporate "finger-men" by arranging your fingers to resemble people. That makes me so angry, I want to swear.

People should learn to be articulate enough to describe things. Hands are for picking up pencils, spoons and garbage. I can play the piano with my hands (although not well). I can hand-paint with them, I can make bread dough, and I can even place them under my pillow when I go to sleep at night. They fit in there incredibly well. I can type with them on a keyboard, as I'm doing now. I can participate in a round of applause. I can turn the pages of a book. I can turn my key inside a lock. I can even use my hands to punch and slap people that use their hands to enhance their stories.

Hands are not for enhancing oral communication. We have mouths, people, mouths, and voiceboxes in our throats. Only those that need to use sign language should use their hands for speaking, thank you very much. Argh. I'm going to go swear into a pillow now, using speech. I'll use my hands to clench on to the pillow.

7 comments:

Douglas said...

There's only one gesture that actually bothers me...

J.J. in L.A. said...

Hand gestures don't bother me so much...unless it's the 1-finger salute or the circling of the finger next to the templehodsp to say that someone's crazy. I probably already know that. lol!

Phil said...

I can't believe you're ok with clapping! While I mostly agree with the hand gestures thing, I definitely think clapping is pretty ridiculous. Who ever decided it was ok to show one's approval by making noise with your hands? How primitive.

Michael said...

Never thought of it that way. Interesting... I shall observe this phenomenon that you call ridiculous and primitive.

Michael.

Pavitra said...

interesting......
it annoys me too sometimes....
:)

Anonymous said...

I feel a resonating disappointment in the fact that the author does not seem to be in tuned with body language. Gestures, is just a whole other part of it.
Especially when speaking to a person who might not completely understand your language, aka foreigner, aka someone who isn't inside your little world.
I know... shocking isn't it.

Or when, passions are a little heavy, a soft caress could speak entire paragraphs.
How exactly would you articulate that clearly? Go on, I've got some time.

Anonymous said...

TrollmasterV672
has landed.
Cue* dramatic music approach
Nuna nuna nuna!
*fan fare

I will let this be fair though, if you can really convince me though, that you can articulate all this clearly, through some way I'm not aware of, I'll gratefully concede defeat, to the superiority of your prepubescent rantings.