Are praxical gestures semiotised in service encounters

Abstract

Empirically based on the study of praxical gestures in service encounters, this paper questions the possibility of semiotisation for such gestures. Praxical gestures are supposed to be extra-communicative and thus “unsemiotised”. In reality, although they are not coded in a systematic way, their meaning is fundamentally connected to their context of realisation. An analysis of the contexts in which praxical gestures appear in service interactions demonstrates that they become “semiotised”. when they are put into context and that they have a full part in the script of service interactions.