The Ultimate Body Language Book

do just that, they illustrate the meaning of words. An example of an illustrator is the motion of throwing
whilst speaking of tossing a ball or a punching motion to emphasize what happened during a fight. We
could describe an trophy fish, as in “It was this long” then spreading the hands apart to show just how
long it was. Other examples include, finger pointing, head bobbing, batoning or slapping the hands
together. Bill Clinton made the batoning motion famous as he emphasized nearly each word in his
denial speech against his involvement with Monica Lewinsky “I did not, have, sexual, relations, with,
that, women.” as his arm pumped up and down. Other examples include Adolf Hitler as he gestured his
followers into submission and television evangelists who forcefully hammer their words onto others.
The type of illustrators used, vary by culture and also vary in frequency. Latin cultures for example,
will use more illustrators than Anglo-Saxon cultures, and they in turn, use more than Asian cultures. In
business, the differences between cultures are especially important since Asian cultures might see the
use of illustrators as a lack of intelligence if used too frequently and in Latin cultures it might be
construed as a lack of interest or involvement to use too few.