JAPANESE BODY LANGUAGE: 7 KEY GESTURES TO LEARN blog.gaijinpot.com

posted by  banzaitokyo | 7 years, 10 months ago in Gaijin Lifestyle

It may surprise you to know there are close to 100 different gestures regularly used by Japanese people to communicate with friends, colleagues and the general public. While most of those used by Western countries are crude or considered a novelty, the Japanese rely on hand gestures to communicate everything from basic requests to expressing emotion and personal preferences.

Those visiting who don't speak Japanese often rely on the use of hand gestures to get around which can be bemusing, considering some mean the total opposite to what has been learnt back home. Some common gestures have spread globally, making them more identifiable, and are even mimicked by foreigners; however, in many cases their significance has been lost or misinterpreted.