Dismissive gestures are nonverbal putdowns. Popular entertainment propagates them, just as it propagates verbal putdowns. If you become familiar with them, you can recognize them more easily, and then you can think to yourself, "How dramatic of him/her!" or "What a fine imitation of <name-your-favorite-film-role>!"

Doodles by T.D. Lee, created while working with C.N. Yang at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The work led to their receiving the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1957. Not all doodles are dismissive gestures. Photo courtesy Brookhaven National Laboratory.
Here's Part III of a little catalog of dismissive gestures. See "Dismissive Gestures: II," Point Lookout for March 28, 2007, for more.
- Snorting
- A snort can say, "What you just said fouled the air, and I must clear my nasal passages before I comment." The "laugh snort" — laughing through your nose — adds extra derision.
- Head bobbling
- Especially when combined with a grimace, and performed while your conversation partner is talking, this means, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've heard your nonsense before."
- Hand yapping
- Holding up one hand, making a "C," and then rapidly opening and closing the jaws of the C as if they were the jaws of the speaker, means roughly the same thing as head bobbling.
- Raising one eyebrow
- The eyebrow lift, deftly
executed, can be an
expression of derision - True experts combine the eyebrow lift with a dip of the countenance, a stern cast of the features, and raising of the eyes, as if looking over the top of eyeglasses. It means, "Come now, you fool, get with the program."
- Failure to return service
- In the volley of conversation, when we sometimes receive the "ball," others expect us to return it. Failure to do so, especially by someone with power, implies disregard for the conversation, and possibly for the conversers. For extra disdain, instead of responding, sit quietly and sip your coffee or tea.
- Turning your back
- This gesture is most effective when performed standing. In a "party" situation — a reception or gathering — the turned back of a person of status or power can be very painful.
- Stiff-arm
- One or both arms forward, with the palm facing the target, in a variation of the "stiff-arm" used by NFL football players, is a way of saying, "Back off, buddy, and let me tell you how it is."
- Playing with workplace toys
- Workplace toys include pens and pencils, paper, rubber bands, and the like. To play with them, we doodle; we fill in the loops of letters such as b, d, p, and e; or we endlessly stretch and relax rubber bands or flick them off into space. Idly playing with workplace toys while someone is speaking can sometimes send a message of distraction or disdain, as, "You're talking, but I want to move on."
Three things to remember. One: when we use dismissive gestures unintentionally, they can still sting. Two: when we feel the sting of someone else's dismissive gesture, it might have been unintentional. And Three: at times, we've all forgotten One and Two. Top
Next Issue
Are you fed up with tense, explosive meetings? Are you or a colleague the target of a bully? Destructive conflict can ruin organizations. But if we believe that all conflict is destructive, and that we can somehow eliminate conflict, or that conflict is an enemy of productivity, then we're in conflict with Conflict itself. Read 101 Tips for Managing Conflict to learn how to make peace with conflict and make it an organizational asset. Order Now!
For more on gestures of all kinds, take a look at Field Guide to Gestures: How to Identify and Interpret Virtually Every Gesture Known to Man, by Nancy Armstrong and Melissa Wagner. It's complete with full-color illustrations. Order from Amazon.com
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Related articles
More articles on Workplace Politics:
Is It Blame or Is It Accountability?
- When we seek those accountable for a particular failure, we risk blaming them instead, because many
of us confuse accountability with blame. What's the difference between them? How can we keep blame at bay?
The Risky Role of Hands-On Project Manager
- The hands-on project manager manages the project and performs some of the work, too. There are lots
of excellent hands-on project managers, but the job is inherently risky, and it's loaded with potential
conflicts of interest.
Communication Traps for Virtual Teams: I
- Virtual teams encounter difficulties that rarely confront face-to-face teams. What special challenges
do they face, and what can we do about them?
The Deck Chairs of the Titanic: Strategy
- Much of what we call work is about as effective and relevant as rearranging the deck chairs
of the Titanic. We continue our exploration of futile and irrelevant work, this time emphasizing
behaviors related to strategy.
Capability Inversions and Workplace Abuse
- A capability inversion occurs when the person in charge of an effort is far less knowledgeable about
the work than are the people doing that work. In some capability inversions, abusive behavior by the
unit's leader might be misinterpreted as bullying.
See also Workplace Politics, Effective Communication at Work and Conflict Management for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
Coming December 13: Contrary Indicators of Psychological Safety: I
- To take the risks that learning and practicing new ways require, we all need a sense that trial-and-error approaches are safe. Organizations seeking to improve processes would do well to begin by assessing their level of psychological safety. Available here and by RSS on December 13.
And on December 20: Contrary Indicators of Psychological Safety: II
- When we begin using new tools or processes, we make mistakes. Practice is the cure, but practice can be scary if the grace period for early mistakes is too short. For teams adopting new methods, psychological safety is a fundamental component of success. Available here and by RSS on December 20.
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Beware any resource that speaks of "winning" at workplace politics or "defeating" it. You can benefit or not, but there is no score-keeping, and it isn't a game.
- Wikipedia has a nice article with a list of additional resources
- Some public libraries offer collections. Here's an example from Saskatoon.
- Check my own links collection
- LinkedIn's Office Politics discussion group