Gesture

Selection from Herman, D., Jahn, M., & Ryan, M-L. (2010). Gesture - William McGregor

Gesture: visible bodily actions of hands, arms, face and head.
-Humans use in interacting with each other face-to-face, accompanied narrative speech.
-Gestures play important roles in spoken narrative - expressive means for denoting the aspects of storyworld that is difficult to convey in words.
-Frequency depends on the narrator, narrative, narrative situation and culture
-Gestures can be important for collaboratively constructing narrative.
McNeill proposes gesture types and three levels: Narrative, metanarrative and paranarrative
Narrative frame; constituted by expressions representing the storyworld. Gestures: iconic and deictic (pointing) gestures
Metanarrative frame: concerns the organisation of the narrative as a text. Gestures: deictic or metaphoric (representing an image of the narrative), and beats (mark the significance word or phrase)
Paranarrative frame: concerns the construal of the narrative interaction itself - is constituted by the projection of the narrator's own voice to audience. Gestures: beats and deictic, and gaze!