Viewpoints mimetic

Analysis of miners speech and gesture suggests, first, that individuals can represent themselves and others as characters in their narrative (mimetic view point) and second, that they can move outside of this embodied experience to observe and analyze events from a distance (analytic viewpoint). When speakers assume a mimetic viewpoint, they enact events directly with no rhetorical distance between themselves and the action. When speakers assume an analytic viewpoint, they place temporal and spatial distance between their current position (as observers or narrators) and the events they describe. 

Simultaneous Vietvpoints. Speech and gesture provide two channels of communication that enable speakers to present more than one viewpoint simultaneously. Miners can employ mimetic and analytic viewpoints concor-dantly, or they can employ different viewpoints simultaneously in speech and gesture. The miners we observed employ mimetic viewpoints simultaneously in speech and gesture, analytic viewpoints simultaneously in speech and gesture, or twi) different viewpoints simultaneously in speech and gesture. 

Speech Here I am flaggin and screamin (mimetic viewpoint in speech). He was criming at me with the continuous miner (analytic viewpoint in speech). There was very little space between me and the mining machine (analytic viewpoint in spteech). My boss screamed (analytic viewpoint), Get out (mimetic viewpoint). 

When speakers employ mimetic viewpoints, they reenact their embodied memories of risk. They also reenact their sensory and physical memory of the spaces, social relationships, and institutional relationships they encountered as they worked. As the following discussion suggests, their gestures depict more than the mere physical dimensions of objects and spaces in their environment. 

Imitating Spaces. Miners also use mimetic viewpoints to depict the size of the physical spaces they must work in. Unlike conventional fish stories in which speakers use their hands to depict the size of objects from a view outside of the object, miners use their entire bodies to depict the magnitude of hazards they have observed. 

FIG. 7.2. E3 holds the wheel intensely. In this mimetic viewpoint gesture, he reenacts his physical struggle to control the machine with his entire body. 

Mimetic Viewpoint Speech Imitates voice and tone of parrot. 

Mimetic Viewpoint Gesture Miner raises hands, grasps bars, shakes them. 

FIG. 7.8. E5 traces shape of an arch with flat palm of hand, fingers splayed. In a mine, these steel arches are overhead—like the metal supports in a tunnel. As she describes the arches, E5 assumes a viewpoint that is above the arches, looking down upon them, as she traces their shape with her hands. To assume a mimetic viewpoint of the same space, miners hold both hands overhead in the shape of an arch. 

Mimetic Viewpoint in gesture (Mimetic Other) Miner depicts her sister holding the roof bolt. The audience observes what the miner saw—her sister s embodied fear."... 

Mimetic viewpoint in gesture (Imitating geography). Mimetic viewpoint in speech (Imitating self). E5 repeats ge.sture pulling strata together. Her hands imitate the strata. 

Mimetic viewpoint in gesture (imitating geogre y). Analytic viewpoint in speech analytic perspective). Hands come together again, palms flat. E5 s hands imitate (a second time) the strata as it pulls together under the force of the nxjf bolt. Her speech explains the action that she depicts with her hands. 

When speakers assume mimetic viewpoint gestures, audiences observe the speaker as an actor who re-presents events and situations that are temporally and spatially distant. When speakers assume analytic viewpoints, speakers and audience share the same rhetorical relation to the objects and situations... 

You set your steel in Right hand rises quickly after previous phrase to chin level. Right hand makes a fist, drops suddenly so that the movement is actually straight down —> center of pod tiutlined above. Left hand remains in L-shaped position at outside boundary of the pod. Right hand mimetic viewpoint - user Left hand analytic viewpoint - size of object... 

The effects of viewpoint on semantic content become apparent when we compare the viewpoints that Libby assumes in each of the five conditions. In the demonstration, she sets up the physical context for the demonstration ( Have 1 got my hole drilled ). In the scientific process condition, she explains how the mechanics of roof support (the layers, the bearing plates) produce the intended consequences ( to make it a solid beam ). In the gesture-only condition, she assumes a mimetic viewpoint as though she were following a checklist of instructions Check gas. . . Sound the top. .. Drill the hole to the desired depth. Each condition limits the viewpoints that Libby can assume and thus the range of topics she can represent in her narrative. 

Mimetic viewpoint in Complex viewpoint Switches hands. Switches hands. 

Mimetic viewpoint index finger Right hand down than previous... 

Her statements are semantically similar in each condition, but they convey very different acts when we factor in the meanings conveyed in gesture. In the demonstration and revision, Libby uses a mimetic viewpoint to demonstrate how she sets the steel in the pod. In the demonstration without speech, Libby assumes an analytic viewpoint. In this condition, Libby s arm depicts the steel as it rises. The gesture elaborates on the speech, showing how the drill steel spins as it rises in front of the watching miner. Without speech, Libby is free to focus on gestures and the meanings she conveys in her hands. 

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