Kinesics

Information about Kinesics

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. Part of Birdwhistell's work involved making film of people in social situations and analyzing them to show different levels of communication not clearly seen otherwise. The study was joined by several other anthropologists, including Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson.

Drawing heavily on descriptive linguistics, Birdwhistell argued that all movements of the body have meaning (ie. are not accidental), and that these non-verbal forms of language (or paralanguage) have a grammar that can be analysed in similar terms to spoken language. Thus, a "kineme" is "similar to a phoneme because it consists of a group of movements which are not identical, but which may be used interchangeably without affecting social meaning" (Knapp 1972:94-95).

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." He also concluded that there were no universals in these kinesic displays - a claim disputed by Paul Ekman's analysis of universals in facial expression.

A few Birdwhistell-isms are as follows:

Social personality is a temporo-spatial system. All behaviors evinced by any such system are components of the system except as related to different levels of abstractions.
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.
No kineme ever stands alone.

In one current application, kinesics are used as signs of deception by interviewers. Interviewers look for clusters of movements to determine the veracity of the statement being uttered. 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.

References

Birdwhistell, R. 1970. Kinesics in Context. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia.
Knapp, M. 1972. Nonverbal Communication in Human Interaction. Reinhart and Winston Inc., New York.
McDermott, R. 1980. Profile: Ray L. Birdwhistell, The Kinesis Report 2, 3: 1-16.

External references

Report on kinesics by David B. Givens for the Center for Nonverbal Studies.

Body language is a term for communication using body movements or gestures (such as the '''Pinocchio blue^[1]) instead of, or in addition to, sounds, verbal language or other communication.
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facial expression results from one or more motions or positions of the muscles of the face. These movements convey the emotional state of the individual to observers. Facial expressions are a form of nonverbal communication.
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gesture is a form of non-verbal communication made with a part of the body, used instead of or in combination with verbal communication. The language of gesture allows individuals to express a variety of feelings and thoughts, from contempt and hostility to approval and
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19th century - 20th century - 21st century
1920s 1930s 1940s - 1950s - 1960s 1970s 1980s
1949 1950 1951 - 1952 - 1953 1954 1955

Year 1952 (MCMLII
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Ray Birdwhistell is the founder of kinesics as a field of inquiry and research (Danesi, 2006). The term kinesics was originally coined by Birdwhistell, and he also proposed the term kineme (Ottenheimer, 2007, p. 129). He was born in 1918 and died October 19, 1994.
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Ballet is academic dance form and technique which is taught in ballet schools according to specific methods. There are many ballet schools around the world that specialize in various styles of ballet and different techniques offered.
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Anthropology (from Greek: ἄνθρωπος, anthropos, "human being"; and λόγος, logos, "speech" lit. to talk about human beings) is the study of humanity.
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Margaret Mead (December 16, 1901, Philadelphia – November 15, 1978, New York City) was an American cultural anthropologist.

Early years

Mead was the first of five children, born into a Quaker family, [1] raised in Doylestown, Pennsylvania by her university
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Gregory Bateson
Birth: 9 May 1904
Grantchester, England
Death: 4 July 1980
San Francisco, CA
School/tradition: Anthropology
Main interests: anthropology, social sciences, linguistics, cybernetics, Systems theory
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Descriptive linguistics is the work of analyzing and describing how language is spoken (or how it was spoken in the past) by a group of people in a speech community. All scholarly research in linguistics is descriptive; like all other sciences, its aim is to observe the linguistic
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Paralanguage refers to the non-verbal elements of communication used to modify meaning and convey emotion. Paralanguage may be expressed consciously or unconsciously, and it includes the pitch, volume, and, in some cases, intonation of speech.
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Grammar is the study of the rules governing the use of a given natural language, and as such a field of linguistics. Traditionally, grammar included morphology and syntax, in modern linguistics commonly expanded by the subfields of phonetics, phonology, orthography, semantics, and
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phoneme is the smallest unit of speech that distinguishes meaning. Phonemes are not the physical segments themselves, but abstractions of them. An example of a phoneme would be the /t/ found in words like tip,
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Paul Ekman (born 1934) is a psychologist and has been a pioneer in the study of emotions and facial expressions. His carefully conducted experiments were a model of elegance for other psychologists.
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Deception is the act of convincing another to believe information that is not true.

Deception involves concepts like propaganda, distraction and concealment. Fiction, while sometimes manipulative, is not a deception unless it is portrayed as the whole truth; not to be
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Nonverbal communication (NVC) is the process of transmitting messages without spoken words, sometimes called body language, messages can be communicated through facial expressions; gestures; gaze; and posture; Many include the space we use around us; object communication
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Please help Wikipedia by adding references. See the for details.
This article has been tagged since July 2007.

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For the Album by Jay Beckenstein, see .

Eye contact is an event when two people look at each other's eyes at the same time.^[1] It is a form of nonverbal communication known as oculesics and has a large influence on social behavior.
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Posture or posturing may refer to:

Human position
Abnormal posturing, in neurotrauma
Posturography, in neurology

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The term proxemics was introduced by anthropologist Edward T. Hall in 1959 to describe set measurable distances between people as they interact.<ref name="Hall" >Hall, Edward T. (1966).
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Metacommunicative competence is the ability to intervene (in a guiding or constructively controlling way) within difficult conversations and to correct communication problems by utilizing the different ways of practical communication:

verbal communication

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Intercultural competence is the ability of successful communication with people of other cultures. This ability can exist in someone at a young age, or may be developed and improved due to willpower and competence.
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Kinesics

Information about Kinesics

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Early years