by cutting up someone in your car or by feigning an injury on the football pitch in order to get an unfair penalty. The literal translation of “wanker” is “masturbator”, hence the pretty graphic gesture, but as an insult both the word and gesture mean someone who is acting without thinking about other people, e.g. This is a fairly direct gestural translation of the British insult “wanker”. This is an insulting gesture produced by making a hollow tube shape out of your hand by making a circle between your thumb and first two fingers and also curling the other two fingers in the same way, then moving the hand up and down. I was surprised to read that this is specifically British as it seems such as obvious thing to do, but I certainly can’t remember having seen an American do it. This can be made even sillier by touching the little finger of that hand and the thumb of your other hand and doing the same with that hand too, making for a kind of double trumpet. Then the four fingers are moved up and down separately from each other, as if your nose is your mouth and the hand is a trumpet. It consists of the thumb touching the tip of your nose with the rest of your hand pointing away from your face towards the other person. It is a mocking gesture, especially used when you have done something better than someone else or want to challenge them, as in “Nah nah nah nah nah, you can’t catch me”. The British thumbing your nose gesture/ Nah nah nah nah nahĪs indicated by the alternative title to this section, this is a gesture that is generally used by children or by adults who are trying to be deliberately childish. However, the V sign is a much more common way of showing the number two. The slight difference between “two” and “peace”/ “victory” is that you can also indicate the number without causing offense by keeping your index finger and middle finger touching, in which case the direction that your hand is turned doesn’t matter, even in the UK. As with “peace” and “victory”, the direction of the hand does not matter for Americans and matters a lot for the British and a few other nationalities. The descriptions of a V sign above are also all true for the number two, which is most commonly indicated with the index finger and middle finger in a V sign. Americans are rarely aware of the difference caused by turning your hand around for Brits, Australians, etc, and so can sometimes unwittingly offend when making a peace sign/ victory sign or (more commonly) asking for two of something. This kind of V sign is similar to the middle finger gesture explained below, although often more teasing or cheeky than aggressive and so slightly less offensive. However, in the UK and a few other Anglophone places, if you turn your hand around so that the back of your hand is towards the other person, this is a very rude gesture. Differences between British and American gestures and body languageĪ V shape made with your index finger and middle finger means “two”, “peace” or “victory” if you do it with your palm towards the other person and the back of your hand towards yourself.
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