Preface |
Humans live within the reality of their bodies; eating, sleeping, playing and working. They move about in space and time affected by the weather and the environment. Their five senses provide them with information about the social and physical worlds they inhabit. Their central nervous system makes them sneeze or scratch when they itch. Indeed, the biological body seems to determine much of what humans do. Females give birth when the body is ready; the body grows, ages and dies. Daily activities seem to be timed by biological clocks.
The emotions are enmeshed in nearly every social interaction, whether it is a goodbye wave of the hand or a complex set of interactions, as in sports activities or orchestral performances. At festive activities, like football games, humans share their emotions with others, ritualistically and contagiously, cheering on their team, shouting at the other team, moving in unison in a great wave of collective body motion. People feel happy at weddings; they feel sad at funerals. They display their emotions, which tells others how they feel.
The body is not a mere corpus; it is laden with semantic meanings produced by the owners. Bodies, involved in nearly all activities, do not act by themselves. They are not self-willed. Humans think about their bodies and about their social and physical worlds. They symbolize the body, creating meanings, identifying it, labeling it, using it. They perceive themselves to be fat or skinny, male or female, black, white or old. They perceive, think and act. Humans are people watchers, never tiring of watching themselves or others. After arriving home from work or school, where they have spent the day in interaction with others, they may watch television or a movie that depicting even more human interaction. Humans in the modern world are enmeshed deeply in mediated social worlds that influence the ways they think and act.
Humans possess a symbolizing, sensemaking ability. Having a mind as well as a body, humans perceive their bodies and create a sense of self and identity, the body being a part of that identity. Humans adapt to social circumstances; they present themselves to others in self-promoting schemes. They learn to manage themselves in a complex social world, trying to act in accordance with the perceived expectations of the situation. Very skillful people are adept at monitoring themselves and others as they successfully manage their relationships.
Indeed, it seems that people act and perform dramaturgically as though they had a script, a role, a stage and an audience. They groom themselves, dress appropriately, and act out their lines so that others will get the intended message. Although some actors fumble their lines, in general they seem to be good performers or self-agents. Often, they act in routine, unthinking ways, but even the routine is a learned achievement.
Observers pick up on the actions of others, whether the actors are simply gesturing or enacting a complex, contingent series of action events. action communicates meaning to the observer. The nonverbal act becomes a communicative act.
The spoken word accompanies most nonverbal action displays. People talk to others; but they also talk to themselves in inner conversations with the self. They listen to the words of others, words that are full of symbols and expressions that can fire up the imagination. Human language is framed on a nonverbal lexicon. After taking a walk, a person may say, "I took a step." Words express what people already know in their minds. Words may take the place of actions; actions may take the place of words. In face-to-face situations, humans "talk" to others using both body and words. The body "speaks". What it is saying is a matter of interpretation.
People usually know the meaning of specific spoken words, but when they speak with their bodies, they often miss the details, "catching" the meaning of body action in a kind of gestalt, or blurry fashion. Spoken words may be used precisely but they may omit the emotional semantics of body language. No words are needed to see disappointment in a face. How many words would be needed to describe that disappointment? As people age they create a knowledge base, a body lexicon, syntax or corporeal semantics, that helps them interpret body actions. They learn spoken language; they also learn body language, bodily communication.
There is a recognizable sameness in most human behaviors. Otherwise it would be impossible for humans to interact intersubjectively. Yet, individuals have body "signatures" that distinguish them. In addition, human communicative behavior is influenced by gender, ethnicity or aging. Communicative media, such as television and the internet, saturate modern societies, influencing behavior.
The proliferation of popular books and magazines distorts how body communication is perceived. Stereotypes are commonly used in print and television media. Human behavior, of course, is more complex than slogans and clichés suggest. This book focuses on the complex, often hidden, processes that influence human nonverbal behavior. By understanding these influences humans can increase their understanding of nonverbal communication. People can learn to be skillful actors and observors of nonverbal presentations.
The study of nonverbal communication continues to grow across the spectrum of research in many fields of study. Good textbooks and research studies are available to the scholar and the student. Courses about nonverbal behavior and communication are found in modern curricula. From its ungainly start, the field of nonverbal communication is now fully grown. There is, of course, far more in the available literature than any book can present.
There is no pretense in this book that the sum of knowledge about nonverbal communication is revealed or explained, nor is there a finely detailed account of how scholars have created that knowledge. Theories and approaches abound but the author believes that a symbolic interactionist approach is particularly useful to both scholars and students.
The symbolic interactionist (SI) aproach, rooted in early pragmatic thought in America, is rich in history and research. It provides an integrated way to help the researcher and the student understand nonverbal communication. By melding together research from several interdisciplinary sources, the symbolic interactionist can interpret meanings of the body, of identity and intersubjectivity. See chapters nine and ten for a discussion of symbolic interactionism.
The body is always on stage, whether the owner is aware of what the body is "saying" or not. It is inherently, inseparably, intersubjectively and interactively involved in nearly all social circumstances. People perceive; they think and act; they observe and make sense; and then, they start all over again in new mind-body-interaction episodes, all of which have communicative potential. Perhaps it is better to describe this process as behavioral communication. The body is not a mere corpus of flesh; it is a dynamic constellation of symbolic meanings, deeply enmeshed in human activities.
There are four parts in this text. Each successive chapter builds on the previous chapter. Concepts from Part I are used in Part II. Although some topics are used in different chapters, they are presented in terms of the special processes described in that chapter.
Chapter One is introductory; as a survey, it presents the topics to be considered in the remainder of the book and introduces the reader to Symbolic Interactionism.
Chapters Two, Three and Four are devoted to cultural, sociological and psychological aspects of nonverbal communication. These processes are woven into the remaining chapters in the book.
Part II offers analyses of master themes that are imbedded in everyday life and how they influence human nonverbal behavior. Chapters Five, Six, Seven and Eight are devoted to the master themes of gender, ethnicity, aging and the media. Every personal or collective act is in some way infused with one or more of these themes. Concepts from Part I are used in these chapters.
The Symbolic Interactionist approach to nonverbal communication provides a particularly illuminating perspective; it fills a niche in the literature. In chapters Nine and Ten in Part III, the Symbolic Interactionist approach is discussed, delving into its history and conceptual underpinnings and focusing on issues and applications. The human body and will were subjects of interest to George Herbert Mead, an early scholar who influenced the growth of what was to become Symbolic Interactionism. Many distinguished contemporary researchers extend the Symbolic Interactionist approach using multiple methodologies, or triangulation, to enhance their research.
People present themselves to others in interaction. By improving awareness processes, people can become skillful body communicators. Practical exercises are presented in Chapter Ten for the reader's use for that purpose.
Part IV contains References, a Glossary and an Index (print version). Appropriate notes are included at the end of each chapter in the text as are questions for thought and discussion and suggestions for additional reading. The book is designed for people who are taking a first course in nonverbal communication. It can be used as either a main text or as a complementary book.
The author prefers to alternate the use of he and she or her and him to avoid awkwardness. By using the word American, he is referring to the United States; he is fully aware that people from countries above and below the United States are Americans, too. The author uses Black American, Chinese American, Native American and Cuban American as names in his discussions although there are alternative designations he might have used. The intent is to be respectfully inclusive.
There are two people who have influenced me to write this book. I am deeply thankful for the friendship and encouragement of Charles Petrie, former faculty member at the State University of New York at Buffalo, now deceased. His friendship and mentoring sustained me over a period of years, starting with my doctoral work and progressing through my teaching and research at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He knew how to bring out the best in his students. I owe much of my inspiration in writing this book to him. I remember the very careful way that he treated facts and theories and their interpretations. He was a keen observer of human behavior.
In very supportive, insightful and practical ways, my wife Nancy has inspired me, always encouraging me as I worked on this project. She supported me as I spent hours and hours with the materials or punched away on the word processor. She knew when and how to tell me that I should clarify this or that, to make a muddled thought more clear. She reminded me that I was writing not only to professional academics but also to students who have had little or no exposure to the field. She stood in for the future reader. I am very thankful to her for her thoughtful support and help. I dedicate the book to her.
I wish to thank the former students in my nonverbal communication classes, whether they were older adults, Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, Chinese Americans or other Americans. Their influences have found their way into this book. In addition, I dedicate the book to my daughters, Jennifer and Jill, now mature and thriving on their own. Their lives will be made more rich and satisfying by engaging themselves even more deeply in a lifelong understanding of others and their nonverbal communication. Finally, I wish to thank Ms. Jena Howard who so carefully proofread my manuscript. Her meticulous scrutiny has helped me improve the book. Of course, I am totally responsible for errors, omissions and other mistakes that may be found.
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