Gestures

GESTURES (from the French geste—movement of the hands), a part of pantomime, specifically expressive movements that, on the one hand, directly reflect known emotional psycho-physiological states, and on the other, serve as one of the means of communication between people. In the latter capacity, gestures either accompany speech or represent an independent method of conveying thoughts and feelings. This latter function, while underdeveloped and secondary in normal, speaking people, acquires exceptional significance in the deaf-mute and reaches a high level of development, becoming a true language of movement, the symbols of which can convey the most diverse things. Gestures also possess enormous significance in art, especially in oratory and theater, all the more so because, as a most important component of motor activity, they reflect a person's individuality to a significant degree. Such features of gestures as expressiveness, form (for example, angularity or fluidity), tempo, etc., in the opinion of Kretschmer, are in a lawful relationship with body structure and personality character and, along with the latter, serve as signs of specific constitutional types. The only precise method for studying gestures, which is extremely hindered by their diversity and variability, is cinematography. Disorders of gestures are usually not distinguished separately and are studied together with other disorders of expressive movements (see). Gesticulation exhibits great differences in its intensity in normal states depending on nationality, temperament, upbringing, etc. In pathological cases, gesticulation may be abnormally increased or abnormally decreased. Increased gesticulation is observed in manic states and in states of general motor agitation in the mentally ill. A syndrome of compulsive gesticulation is also observed as a focal symptom in organic diseases of the brain (so-called parakineses). To a certain extent, increased gesticulation is mimicked by chorea and especially by tics. Decreased gesticulation is observed in depressive states, in catatonia, and also in the syndrome of general poverty of movement that characterizes paralysis agitans and the post-encephalitic state.