Why We Gesture: The Surprising Role of Hand Movements in Communication

by David McNeill

Gestures are fundamental to the way we communicate, yet our understanding of this communicative impulse is clouded by a number of ingrained assumptions. Are gestures merely ornamentation to speech? Are they simply an 'add-on' to spoken language? Why do we gesture? These and other questions are addressed in this fascinating book. McNeill explains that the common view of language and gesture as separate entities is misinformed: language is inseparable from gesture. There is gesture-speech unity. Containing over 100 illustrations, Why We Gesture provides visual evidence to support the book's central argument that gestures orchestrate speech. This compelling book will be welcomed by students and researchers working in linguistics, psychology and communication.

Genres: Linguistics

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 31, 2015

About the author

David McNeill (born 1933 in California, USA)[1] is an American psychologist and writer specializing in scientific research into psycholinguistics and especially the relationship of language to thought, and the gestures that accompany discourse.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_M...

Reviews

[Tomek D. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book brings only a few new things to the discussion that the author started some years ago with his previous works on gestures. This is a nice overview of his previous writings, more accessible and reader-friendly, but not really novel. A good book but it’s definitely for people familiar with the topic. There are not any detailed definitions of gestures or gesture typologies, they are rather embedded into the book and taken for granted.