Silent history : body language and nonverbal identity, 1860-1914 / Peter K. Andersson.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

The written and verbal traces of the past have been extensively studied by historians, but what about the nonverbal traces? In recent years, historians have expanded their attention to other kinds of sources, but seldom have they taken into account the most vital and omnipresent nonverbal aspect of life - body language. Silent History explores the potential of early photography to uncover the structure and nature of everyday body language in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Through a close study of street photography by pioneering photographers who were the first to document urban everyday life with hidden cameras, Peter Andersson examines a key period of history in a new light. By focusing on a number of body poses and gestures common to the nonverbal communication of the fin de siècle, he reveals the identifications and connotations of daily social interaction beyond the written word. Andersson also depicts a broader picture of the body and its relationship to popular culture by placing photographic analysis within a context of magazine illustration, caricature, music-hall entertainment, and the elusive urban subcultures of the day. Studying archival photographs from Austria, England, and Sweden, Silent History provides a clear picture of the emergence of the modern bodily conventions that still define us.

Cover; Title Page; Copyright; Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; Part One; 1 The Culture of Nonverbal Communication in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries; 2 Posing for Portraits: Conventions and Aberrations; Part Two; Introduction to the Case Studies; 3 Case Study 1: Posing with a Walking-Stick; 4 Case Study 2: "Licensed Withdrawal"; 5 Case Study 3: The Female Akimbo Pose; 6 Case Study 4: The Waistcoat Pose; 7 Case Study 5: Hands in Trouser Pockets; Part Three; 8 Observations on Urban Body Language I: Street Types in the Periodical Press

9 Observations on Urban Body Language II: Stage-Comedy Stock Characters10 Everyday Body Language and Its Contexts: Concluding Remarks; Coda: The Decline of the Graceful Ideal, or How Hitler Became Ridiculous; Appendix: Biographical Notes on Photographers; Notes; Index

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