Lenguaje corporal

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Listening to body language
By NikPeachey
Created 22 Jun 2005 - 12:00
TeachingEnglish
Listening to body language
Submitted by NikPeachey on 22 June, 2005 - 12:00
Body language isn't something that naturally springsto mind when we think about developing our students' listening skills. After all, you can't hear body language. It does, however, play a key role, especially at the subconscious level, in communication and an awareness of it and how it can vary from culture to culture, can be particularly important in helping students to develop their ability to understand in a real environment.
• The featuresof body language
o Eye contact
o Facial expression
o Proximity
o Posture
o Gesture
• Why I teach body language
• How to teach body language
• Conclusion
The features of body language
Body language is made up of a whole range of features many of which we combine together without ever thinking about what it is we are doing or what we are expressing.
Eye contact can have a verysignificant influence when you are interacting with them.
• It can play a key role in helping to establishing rapport and failing to make eye contact in many cultures is associated with being dishonest or having something to hide.
• Eye contact also plays an important role in turn taking during conversation. Among a group of people, a speaker will often make eye contact with the person he or she wants aresponse from. Someone who wants to enter or interject in a conversation will catch the eye of the person speaking to indicate that they want to interrupt, and equally someone who no longer wants to listen will avoid eye contact.
• People who know each other well can communicate mutual understanding with a single look.
• Eye contact is also a way of communicating attraction.
Facial expressionis one of the most obvious and flexible forms of communication and can easily convey mood, attitude, understanding, confusion and a whole range of other things.

Proximity is a far less obvious form of body language but can be equally as meaningful. It is also something that can easily be misinterpreted as it can vary so much from culture to culture.
• Many British people require a lot of'private space' and will often stand much further away from people than other nationalities whilst talking to them. They seldom touch each other whilst speaking.
• Breaking these invisible boundaries can either make them very uncomfortable or signal attraction.
Posture can communicate a number of things.
• Your posture can convey a whole range of attitudes, from interest or the lack of it, todegrees of respect or subordination.
• Speakers often use posture to punctuate what they are saying, shifting forward in their seat or leaning in towards their interlocutor to punctuate an important point, or slumping back to indicate that they have finished making a point.
Gesture can be used to replace verbal communication.
• Different finger, thumb or hand gestures can convey a range ofmeanings in different cultures, from insults to approval or even attraction.
• Many good speakers or storytellers use hand gestures to illustrate their stories.
• It can also form part of punctuation with head nods and hand movements, which relate to the stress, rhythm and tempo of their sentences. Speakers who use their hands a lot often let them drop at the end of a sentence. Heads often nod downwhen words in sentences are stressed.
• One of the most obvious and in many ways useful gestures is pointing. "It's over there." "I want that one."
Why I teach body language
But if we use all these things subconsciously in our own language, so do we really need to 'teach' them in the classroom? For me the answer is yes. Although we do use and interpret all these factors in our first language...