4

body language definitions

As explained, the terms body language and non-verbal communications are rather vague.

So what is body language? And more usefully, what might we regard it to be, if we are to make the most of studying and using it?

The Oxford English Dictionary (revised 2005) definition is:

"body language - noun - the conscious and unconscious movements and postures by which attitudes and feelings are communicated [for example]: his intent was clearly expressed in his body language.

"The Oxford Business English Dictionary offers a slightly different definition. Appropriately and interestingly the Oxford Business English Dictionary emphasizes the sense that body language can be used as a tool, rather than it being an involuntary effect with no particular purpose:

"body language - noun - the process of communicating what you are feeling or thinking by the way you place and move your body rather than by words [for example]: The course trains sales people in reading the customer's body language."

The OED dictionary definition of kinesics - the technical term for body language - depends on the interpretation of 'non-verbal communication':

"kinesics - the study of the way in which certain body movements and gestures serve as a form of non-verbal communication."




Body language is more than those brief descriptions.

Body language certainly also encompasses where the body is in relation to other bodies (often referred to as 'personal space').

Body language certainly also includes very small bodily movements such as facial expressions and eye movements.

Body language also arguably covers all that we communicate through our bodies apart from the spoken words (thereby encompassing breathing, perspiration, pulse, blood-pressure, blushing, etc.)

In this respect, standard dictionary definitions don't always describe body language fully and properly.

We could define body language more fully as:

"Body language is the unconscious and conscious transmission and interpretation of feelings, attitudes, and moods, through:

body posture, movement, physical state, position and relationship to other bodies, objects and surroundings, facial expression and eye movement,

(and this transmission and interpretation can be quite different to the spoken words)."

Words alone - especially emotional words (or words used in emotional situations) - rarely reflect full or true meaning and motive.
We find clues to additional or true meaning in body language.

Being able to 'read' body language therefore helps us greatly:

to know how people feel and what they mean, andto understand better how people might be perceiving our own non-verbal signals, and (often overlooked)
to understand ourselves better, deeper than the words we hear ourselves saying.