Cultural Taboos :: essays research papers

Axtell, Roger E. Gestures The DOs and TABOOS of Body Language Around the World. Jon Wiley & Sons, Inc, 1998 -- Rev. and spread out edition.Over the past decade the causality has been presenting seminars, speeches and workshops well-nigh the United States on the subject of international behavior. This book is the result of accumulation of more than ex years of research on the subject and it includes research on his travels to England, Germany, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. any this reinforced a conviction that movements are powerful communicators used by peck all over the world.The purpose of this book is to let people know how powerful gestures can be when used correctly or incorrectly. He also wants you to know how a gesture can besotted one thing here and an other thing somewhere else, something as simple as a wave good bye, could get you into a lot of trouble in another country. This book was broken pile into seven chapters Chapter 1, illustrated w ith numerous examples, is that not only are gestures and body spoken language powerful communicators, but different cultures use gestures and body language in dramatically different ways.Chapter 2 discusses the most popular gestures found around the world, beginning with how we greet each other. Shaking hand is not the normal greeting. In fact, there are at least a half-dozen other social greetings - even different ways of shaking hands. This chapter also deals with farewells, beckoning, insulting, poignant and other types of gestures.Chapter 3 gets into the special types of gestures such as, American Sign Language, Thai Chi, flirting & kissing.Chapter 4 is designed to help you learn or trace a particular gesture, using scores of drawings. Chapter 5 describes what the author calls the ultimate gesture, which is simply the "smile". It is rarely misunderstood, scientist believe this particular gesture releases chemicals in the brain called endorphins into the system tha t create a mild sense of smell of euphoria. It also may help you slip out of the prickliest or punishing situations world wide.Chapter 6 is an important list of gestures to keep in mind. It is compiled of 20 gestures that can help you separate right from rude, and rude from crude. Chapter 7 is a listing of country-by-country common gestures and body languages. They group the countries by major geographical region.The organization of the book was a combination of narrative and topical.