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[[File:Us navy helicopter landing signals illustration.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Military [[aircraft marshalling|air marshallers]] use hand and body gestures to direct flight operations aboard [[aircraft carrier]]s.]]
A '''gesture''' is a form of [[non-verbal communication]] or non-vocal communication in which visible bodily actions communicate particular messages, either in place of, or in conjunction with, [[speech]]. Gestures include movement of the [[hand]]s, [[face]], or other parts of the [[Human body|body]]. Gestures differ from physical non-verbal communication that does not communicate specific messages, such as purely [[Emotional expression|expressive]] displays, [[proxemics]], or displays of [[joint attention]].<ref name=Kendon>Kendon, Adam. (2004) ''Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-83525-9</ref> Gestures allow individuals to communicate a variety of feelings and thoughts, from contempt and hostility to approval and affection, often together with [[body language]] in addition to [[word]]s when they speak.
Gesture processing takes place in areas of the brain such as [[Broca's area|Broca's]] and [[Wernicke's area]]s, which are used by [[speech]] and [[sign language]].<ref name="Xu">Xu J, Gannon PJ, Emmorey K, Smith JF, Braun AR. (2009). [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2779203/pdf/pnas.0909197106.pdf Symbolic gestures and spoken language are processed by a common neural system.] Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 106:20664–20669. {{doi|10.1073/pnas.0909197106}} PMID 19923436</ref> In fact, language is thought by some scholars to have evolved in ''Homo sapiens'' from an earlier system consisting of manual gestures.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Corballis|first=Michael|title=The gestural origins of language|journal=WIREs Cognitive Science|date=January–February 2010|volume=1}}</ref> The theory that language evolved from manual gestures, termed [[Origin of language#Gestural theory|Gestural Theory]], dates back to the work of 18th-century philosopher and priest [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac|Abbé de Condillac]], and has been revived by contemporary anthropologist Gordon W. Hewes, in 1973, as part of a discussion on the [[origin of language]].<ref>Corballis, Michael. (January/February 2010). "The gestural origins of language." © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. WIREs Cogn Sci 2010 1 2–7</ref>
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==Research==
Gestures have been studied throughout the centuries from different perspectives.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Kendon | first = A | authorlink = Adam Kendon | year = 1982 | title = The study of gesture: Some observations on its history | journal = Recherches Sémiotiques/Semiotic Inquiry | volume = 2 | issue = 1 | pages = 45–62 }}</ref> During the [[Roman Empire]], [[Quintilian]] studied in his Institution Oratoria how gesture may be used in rhetorical discourse. Another broad study of gesture was published by [[England|Englishman]] [[John Bulwer]] in 1644. Bulwer analyzed dozens of gestures and provided a guide on how to use gestures to increase eloquence and clarity for public speaking.<ref>{{cite book | last = Bulwer | first = J | authorlink = John Bulwer | year = 1644 | title = Chirologia: or the Naturall Language of the Hand | location = London }}</ref> [[Andrea De Jorio]] published an extensive account of gestural expression in 1832.<ref>{{cite book | last = de Jorio | first = A | authorlink = Andrea de Jorio | title = Gesture in Naples and Gesture in Classical Antiquity | isbn = 0-253-21506-4 | publisher = [[Indiana University Press]] | orig-year = 1832|year=2002 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=lw8tzmu9-GYC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false }}</ref> A peer reviewed journal ''Gesture'' has been published since 2001,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://benjamins.com/#catalog/journals/gest/issues|title=Gesture Issues|last=|first=|date=2016|website=benjamins.com|publisher=Benjamins|access-date=2016-10-11}}</ref> and was founded by [[Adam Kendon]] and [[Cornelia Müller]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.gesturestudies.com/history.php|title=A brief history of the origins of the ISGS|last=Müller|first=Cornelia|date=|website=ISGS: International Society for Gesture Studies|publisher=|access-date=}}</ref> The International Society for Gesture Studies (ISGS) was founded in 2002.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://gesturestudies.com/|title=International Society for Gesture Studies (ISGS)|last=Andrén|first=Mats|website=gesturestudies.com|access-date=2016-10-11}}</ref>
Performance scholar, Carrie Noland, describes gestures as "learned techniques of the body" and stresses the way gestures are embodied corporeal forms of cultural communication.<ref>Noland, Carrie. ''Agency and Embodiment : Performing Gestures/producing Culture''. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009. p. 2.
</ref> She describes how gesture migrate across bodies and locations to create new cultural meanings and associations and how they might function as a form of "resistance to homogenization".<ref>Noland, Carrie. “Introduction.” ''Migration of Gesture''. Ed. Carrie Noland and Sally Ann Ness. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008. p. x.
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Gesture has also been taken up within [[queer theory]], [[ethnic studies]] and their intersections in [[performance studies]], as a way to think about how the moving body gains social meaning. [[José Esteban Muñoz]] uses the idea of gesture to mark a kind of refusal of finitude and certainty and links gesture to his ideas of ephemera. [[José Esteban Muñoz|Muñoz]] specifically draws on the African-American dancer and [[drag queen]] performer [[Kevin Aviance]] to articulate his interest not in what queer gestures might mean, but what they might perform.<ref>Muñoz, José Esteban. ''Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity''. New York: New York University Press, 2009.
</ref> Juana María Rodríguez borrows ideas of [[Phenomenology (philosophy)|phenomenology]] and draws on Noland and Muñoz to investigate how gesture functions in queer sexual practices as a way to rewrite gender and negotiate power relations. She also connects gesture to [[Giorgio Agamben]]'s idea of "means without ends" to think about political projects of social justice that are incomplete, partial, and legibile within culturally and socially defined spheres of meaning. <ref>Rodríguez, Juana María. ''Sexual Futures, Queer Gestures, and Other Latina Longings''. New York: NYU Press, 2014.
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==Categories==
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===Language development===
Studies affirm a strong link between gesture typology and language development. Young children under the age of two seem to rely on pointing gestures to refer to objects that they do not know the names of. Once the words are learned, they eschewed those referential (pointing) gestures. One would think that the use of gesture would decrease as the child develops spoken language, but results reveal that gesture frequency increased as speaking frequency increased with age. There is, however, a change in gesture typology at different ages, suggesting a connection between gestures and language development. Children most often use pointing and adults rely more on iconic and beat gestures. As children begin producing sentence-like utterances, they also begin producing new kinds of gestures that adults use when speaking (iconics and beats). Evidence of this systematic organization of gesture is indicative of its association to language development.<ref name="mayberry"/>
Gestural languages such as [[American Sign Language]] and its regional siblings operate as complete natural languages that are gestural in modality. They should not be confused with [[finger spelling]], in which a set of emblematic gestures are used to represent a written alphabet. American sign language is different from gesturing in that concepts are modeled by certain hand motions or expressions and has a specific established structure while gesturing is more malleable and has no specific structure rather it supplements speech. We should note, that before an established sign language was created in Nicaragua after the 1970s, deaf communities would use "home signs" in order to communicate with each other. These home signs were not part of a unified language but were still used as familiar motions and expressions used within their family—still closely related to language rather than gestures with no specific structure.<ref>{{cite book|last=Fernandez|first=Eva M.|title=Fundamentals of Psycholinguistics|year=2011|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|isbn=9781405191470|page=77|author2=Helen Smith Cairns}}</ref> This is similar to what has been observed in the gestural actions of chimpanzees. Gestures are used by these animals in place of verbal language, which is restricted in animals due to their lacking certain physiological and articulatory abilities that humans have for speech. Corballis (2009) asserts that "our hominin ancestors were better pre-adapted to acquire language-like competence using manual gestures than using vocal sounds."<ref>Corballis, M. C. (2010), The gestural origins of language. WIREs Cogn Sci, 1: 2–7. doi: 10.1002/wcs.2</ref> This leads to a debate about whether humans, too, looked to gestures first as their modality of language in the early existence of the species. The function of gestures may have been a significant player in the evolution of language.
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Gestures play a central role in religious or spiritual rituals such as the [[Christianity|Christian]] [[sign of the cross]]. In [[Hinduism]] and [[Buddhism]], a ''[[mudra]]'' ([[Sanskrit]], literally "seal") is a symbolic gesture made with the hand or fingers. Each mudra has a specific meaning, playing a central role in Hindu and Buddhist [[iconography]]. An example is the Vitarka mudra, the gesture of discussion and transmission of Buddhist teaching. It is done by joining the tips of the thumb and the index together, while keeping the other fingers straight.
Gestures are learned embodied cultural practices that can function as a way to interpret ethnic, gender, and sexual identity.
==Neurology==
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