Title: Shaking One’s Leg

General Information about Item:

• Customary Lore: Body Gesture
• Language: Japanese
• Country of Origin: Japan
• Informant: Christina Bae
• Date Collected: 10-18-18

Informant Data:

• Christina Bae is a senior student at Dartmouth College. She was born in and raised in Japan. She went to the American School in Japan until ten years old. During this time she became fluent in both Korean and Japanese. When she was ten, Christina and her family moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Her family has resided there ever since. She currently is majoring in Japanese and Chinese Language and Literature. As a talented pianist, Christina enjoys performing as well as teaching piano to the local members of Hanover.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: Japanese society often has strict set of social norms that people should not act too silly or offend one another publicly. However, insulting gestures can still be found in the culture, albeit in more subtle ways than some of the other cultures that have been analyzed by my group (e.g. Italian and French). Especially in work place environments, age and experience hierarchies are strictly in place; further, corporate ranking determine the level of language, body language, and respect one should show to another person at the job. As such, small gestures such as shaking one’s foot is viewed as a very deliberate action to possibly undermine another person’s authority or to subtly hint that they are bored of listening to them. Due to the clear expectations of behavior set by Japanese corporations, a lack of adherence to these behavioral rules (e.g. shaking one’s foot during a meeting) can be viewed as an insulting gesture.
• Social Context: This gesture was mentioned when the interviewee was asked about any insulting gestures that exist in Japanese culture. Christina stated that while growing up she was told explicitly not to shake her legs because it is a rude or impolite thing to do. Especially in situations in which you need to show respect to another person (e.g. in the classroom to the professor or at the work to your boss), you should never shake your leg in front of your superior. The act may be subtle, but it is taken seriously as a rude or impolite gesture.

Item:

• The gesture begins with the actor crossing his or her legs while sitting down. Then the actor shakes on of his or her feet.

Associated file (a video, audio, or image file):

Transcript:

• “Japanese people find it very disturbing when someone is sitting down and shaking one of their legs. People view that as a disrespectful action. but in the States, I’ve heard no one ever comment on me shaking my legs. In one of my Japanese classes at Dartmouth, the Professor noticed me shaking my legs and said, ‘Oh I’ll end class early today because Bae-san (Christina) seems very bored about this lesson.’ She made a snarky comment about my feet and took it in a negative way. ”  -Christina Bae

Informant’s Comments:

• It’s a very subtle gesture, but Japanese people do take notice if you shake your leg.

Collector’s Comments:

• This gesture was particularly interesting to collect mainly because “shaking one’s leg” is not considered to be a rude or impolite gesture in the United States; however, in Japan, it seems that people become very concerned when a conversation partner begins to shake their legs. I think that the attention to subtle body language is very telling of Japanese culture in which people are expected to “read the situation in the room” and act accordingly. In other words, people naturally learn about social norms and the appropriate way to act in certain situations. Because body language is one of the first signs of change in a person’s attitude or even their thoughts, it seems that more subtle gestures have deeper meanings in Japanese cultures than in Western counterparts. For example, in the United States, just as Christina said, I have never heard anyone make a comment about my shaking my own legs.

Collector’s Name: Young Jang 

Tags/Keywords:

• Insulting Gesture
• Shaking One’s Leg
• Japanese Insulting Gesture