According to my mother’s elder sister, our favourite aunt (who
could count up to ten in Bushman and utter his formal greeting
for our delight although invariably she went dangerously purple
in the process), it was fatal to remark on the Bushman’s
smallness in his presence. More, it was often perilous to show in
one’s bearing that one was aware of dealing with a person
smaller than oneself.
Our old ’Suto hands strongly supported my aunt with their
own colourful illustrations. They said they had always been
warned never to show any surprise if they unexpectedly came
upon a Bushman in the veld in case he took it to imply they could
have seen him sooner had he not been so small. When,
unexpectedly, one ran into a Bushman the only wise thing to do
was promptly to blame oneself for the surprise and say, “Please
THINKING WITH YOUR BODY 77THOUGHT PROVOKERS1Watch someone talking in regular conversation on a TV program.
Notice where they put their hands. Notice also where they look
when they speak. You don’t need to know what their gestures
mean, just be aware of them.
2 Ask someone you know to compare the holiday they had last year
with the one they plan to have this year or next year. Notice where
they look or indicate with their hands when they are talking about
the past compared to when they are talking about the future.
3 Listen carefully to someone on the phone. Determine when they are
associated and when they are dissociated, by the emotion (or
absence of it) in their voice.
4 Pay attention to one person in the next meeting you attend.
(Choose a meeting where you do not have a key role so that you
can give time to observing someone else.) Determine how much of
the time they are in the present with the other people in the meeting
and how much time they spend elsewhere. Do this by noticing their
eye movements.
5 When you are next with someone from a different culture (and that
might still be from the same country as yourself), adopt as much of
their nonverbal behaviour as you can. What do you learn about
their underlying values (what has to be true for them to behave in
this way) when you do this?