Gesture studies and anthropological perspectives

Abstract

Abstract This contribution is the introduction for the special issue of Gesture entitled “Anthropology of Gesture”. As such, it raises two main questions: how do gestures contribute to the field of anthropology? And, inversely, how anthropology can improve our understanding of gesture and gestural behaviours? Of particular importance for this special issue, is the emphasis on what Lempert called “the anthropological sensibility” which aims at taking a more cultural and ethnographic approach to the study of gesture, especially but not only in cross-cultural contexts. The last part of this introduction presents all the contributions of this special issue.