State-of-the-art: two major approaches

In the area of gesture research there are two major approaches:

1. Birdwhistell and others ([Malandro, Barker & Barker 1989]) Gesture should be seen as a communication system based on the same structural units as language. For example, the phonetic concept of allphones, phones, phonemes and morphemes is compareable to a kinesic concept which makes use of the same units called allokine, kine, kineme and kine morpheme. For Birdwhistell gesture represents a complex structure of body movements which can be seen as a "formalized language code".
2. Dittman, Ekman and others ([Malandro, Barker & Barker 1989], [Kendon 1983]) Ditman argues that gesture in general does not provide a "fomalized language code" because it does not form an alphabet comprised of discrete units and it is not governed by explicit and specific rules. Nevertheless, it provides information to a communication or an interaction, and thus it supports speech.