CHAPTER 5 GESTURAL REPRESENTATIONS OF VIEWPOINTS
5.1 Gestural features and gestural viewpoints
In the current study, we have recognized five gestural features—gestural space, handedness, stroke duration, frequency, and the involvement of other parts of the body as five criteria for use in analysis in determining different gestural viewpoints.
How the five gestural features interact and collaborate with each other in representing the three viewpoints, and how these gestural features could serve as distinctive criteria in identifying different viewpoints are discussed in this section. In particular, we will see how the performance of each gestural feature can be used to distinguish between observer and character viewpoint, due to the limited data of speaker viewpoint in gesture in the current data. Table 5 shows how gestures of observer and character viewpoint are performed with reference to the five gestural features when each gestural feature is analyzed as showing more gestural complexity: the hand movement involves Center and Periphery space, use of both hands, longer stroke duration, repetition of the same stroke, and the involvement of other parts of the body. In Chapter 3, it was suggested that a speaker’s gesture often shows more gestural complexity when representing character viewpoint, since speakers are using their hand movements to enact characters’ actions or deeds. We will see whether C-VPT gestures produced in the current data indeed perform more complex gestural features than O-VPT gestures. Table 6 further shows the number of complex gestural features
used in C-VPT and in O-VPT gestures.
Table 5. Gestural features that show more gestural complexity
Viewpoint
*The percentages that are shaded in grey refer to each (complex) gestural feature used between C-VPT and O-VPT gestures; the percentages shown without the grey shading refer to the five (complex) gestural features used within a C-VPT or an O-VPT gesture.
Table 6.
Number of complex gestural features used in C-VPT and O-VPT gestures Viewpoint between C-VPT and O-VPT gestures; the percentages shown without the grey shading refer to the five (complex) gestural features used within a C-VPT or an O-VPT gesture.From Table 5, we can see that the percentage of each gestural feature which
shows more gestural complexity in C-VPT gestures is much higher than that in O-VPT. Table 6 further shows the number of complex gestural features that are used in two types of gestures, and suggests that the percentage of C-VPT gestures that are composed of two or more than two complex gestural features is higher than that of O-VPT gestures. In addition, the use of three or more than three complex gestural features is only seen in C-VPT gestures but not in O-VPT gestures. This suggests that C-VPT gesture indeed is more possible to be composed of gestural features that show greater gestural complexity than O-VPT gesture, and that a C-VPT gesture is composed of more of these complex gestural features than O-VPT gesture to be identified as representing character viewpoint. O-VPT gesture might show none of these gestural features that show greater gestural complexity (12 out of total 52 cases of O-VPT), or at most two complex gestural features. To sum up, speakers in representing character viewpoint through gesture perform gestural features that show more gestural complexity and make use of a greater number of these complex gestural features within a C-VPT gesture than an O-VPT gesture.
At the same time, we can also see how gestures of observer and character viewpoint are performed with reference to the five gestural features when each gestural feature is analyzed as showing less gestural complexity. It was suggested in Chapter 3 that speakers plainly depict the past events like an observer that does not
attempt to walk into the original scene of the past events in representing observer viewpoint. As a result, speakers tend to produce a “simpler” gesture, which means that the gesture shows less gestural complexity, when representing observer viewpoint. A simple gesture that shows less gestural complexity might have the following gestural features: the gestural space is confined to the Center-Center space, use of a single hand, shorter stroke duration, no repetition of the same stroke, and no involvement of other body parts. Table 7 shows the percentage of each gestural feature that shows less gestural complexity used in C-VPT and O-VPT gestures:
Table 7. Gestural features that show less gestural complexity
Viewpoint
In Table 5, we have seen that the percentage of each gestural feature that shows more gestural complexity in C-VPT gestures is apparently higher than that in O-VPT gestures. However, the distinctive difference between C-VPT and O-VPT gesture on
the percentage of the use of gestural features that show simpler and less gestural complexity is not at all obvious, as shown in Table 7 (for example, 49.5% of C-VPT and 50.5% of O-VPT concerning the feature “no involvement of other parts of the body”). Only the results for the performance of shorter stroke duration show a relatively clear distinction between C-VPT and O-VPT gestures (32.1% v.s. 67.9%).
Such result, nevertheless, does not mean that the five gestural features identified in this study fail in differentiating observer and character viewpoint. Instead, if we combine two sets of the performances of each gestural feature presented in Table 5 and Table 7 and look at the correlation between each gestural feature and gestural viewpoint, we find that these five gestural features is actually crucial in identifying observer viewpoint and character viewpoint.
The data were analyzed by using Chi-square tests. The results suggest that the correlations between each gestural feature, including gestural space, handedness, stroke duration, and frequency, and gestural viewpoint are statistically significant.3 With respect to the correlation between the involvement of other body parts and gestural viewpoint, there are no instances of O-VPT gesture that is accompanied with other bodily movements. In general, these statistics concerning to the data shown in
3 The result of the Chi-square test for the distribution of C-VPT and O-VPT gestures accompanying the gestural space at Center-Center and Center-Periphery/Periphery is 2.095(1)=9.73; that for the use of single and both hands is 2.095(1)=10.2; that for shorter and longer stroke duration is 2.095(1)=20.5; and that for repetition of the same stroke and no repetition is 2.095(1)=6.65.
Table 5 and Table 7 show that the five gestural features identified in this study as basis for analysis are indeed indicative in analyzing gestural viewpoints.
Table 8 further shows the number of simple gestural features used in both C-VPT and O-VPT gestures.
Table 8.
Number of simple gestural features used in C-VPT and O-VPT gestures Viewpoint representing observer viewpoint with four and five simple gestural features comprise the majority of all O-VPT gestures (44 out of a total of 52 O-VPT gestures). In general, Table 8 suggests that speakers make use of greater number of gestural features that show less gestural complexity in an O-VPT gesture than a C-VPT gesture.To sum up, in presenting how observer and character viewpoint is represented through the use of five gestural features, this section has proved that each gestural feature indeed is significant and in deciding gestural viewpoints. However, it is also important to note that the identifications of C-VPT and O-VPT gestures by use of the five gestural features as analyzing criteria are not definite. Rather, the use of the five gestural features as analyzing criteria suggests that the identifications of C-VPT and O-VPT made along a continuum.