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Definition of "kinesics" []

  • The study of nonlinguistic bodily movements, such as gestures and facial expressions, as a systematic mode of communication. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "kinesics" in a sentence
  • "The term kinesics caught on among the linguists of the time, but in the 1960s, the kineme went the way of the phoneme."
  • "One of Dances favorite quotes came from a man who predated the coining of the term kinesics by a hundred years: Charles Darwin, who said, Repressed emotion almost always comes to the surface in some form of body motion."
  • "The ability to read and interpret body language is known as kinesics."