SUBTEXTrepeated by thousands in crowds was the V for victory sign. The
subtext of that gesture was a damning indictment of the way the
leaders had governed.
In the United States, the middle finger pointed upward is a
sign of great insult. News stories keep surfacing of men shooting
at someone who has given them the "finger." Jackie Mason, the
comic, was blacklisted by the Ed Sullivan show many years ago
for allegedly making this gesture which Sullivan thought was di-
rected at him.
Symbolic gestures, ones you make deliberately because they
represent a known subtext, are extremely important. A study involv-
ing twenty-five different countries and twelve thousand people
examined twenty symbolic gestures. They found that few gestures
could be limited to one country only, although Italy seemed to
have the greatest number of symbolic gestures.
Many of these have come to the United States and are used
here, particularly in Italian-American environments. Eight of the
most significant ones are listed on the facing page.
The importance of knowing and understanding these gestures
is apparent when you realize that in Europe, even today, certain
gestures can bring police prosecution. In Germany, drivers making
"the temple screw" at other drivers have been arrested and prose-
cuted! In England, the V for victory sign, if made with the palm
facing out, is a dire insult.
These symbolic gestures are very much linked to particular
cultures. For example, in Argentina, suicide is symbolized by
an extended forefinger to the temple, mimicking a gun. In Japan
it is an imaginary hara-kiri, a sword slice up the belly.
In a foreign country, you can run into trouble if you use the
wrong hand sign. Dr. Robert Saitz and Edward Cervenka, in their