17 Facts About Ray Birdwhistell

Ray L Birdwhistell was an American anthropologist who founded kinesics as a field of inquiry and research.

Ray Birdwhistell had at least as much impact on the study of language and social interaction generally as just nonverbal communication because he was interested in the study of communication more broadly than is often recognized.

Ray Birdwhistell understood body movements to be culturally patterned rather than universal.

Ray Birdwhistell's students were required to read widely, sources not only in communication but anthropology and linguistics.

Ray Birdwhistell was born in Cincinnati on September 29,1918 and died October 19,1994.

Ray Birdwhistell was raised and went to school in Ohio.

Ray Birdwhistell graduated from Fostoria High School in 1936, and was involved in the history club, debate team, journalism, and school plays.

Ray Birdwhistell received his BA in sociology in 1940 from Miami University, his MA in anthropology in 1941 from Ohio State University, and his PhD in anthropology in 1951 from the University of Chicago, where he studied with Lloyd Warner and Fred Eggan.

Ray Birdwhistell taught at the State University of New York at Buffalo from 1956 to 1959.

Ray Birdwhistell argued strongly for the use of film as an essential tool in the study of nonverbal behavior as a way to permit "observation and analysis of human social behavior which has hitherto been hidden from comparative analysis".

From 1969 until he retired in 1988, Ray Birdwhistell held the position of professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, where he worked closely with Dell Hymes and Erving Goffman, brought Gregory Bateson in as a guest speaker, and influenced a new generation of students.

Ray Birdwhistell reputedly came to the attention of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson when he attended a showing of one of their ethnographic films.

Ray Birdwhistell died of liver cancer on October 19,1994, at his home in Brigantine, New Jersey.

Ray Birdwhistell pointed out that "human gestures differ from those of other animals in that they are polysemic, that they can be interpreted to have many different meanings depending on the communicative context in which they are produced".

Ray Birdwhistell indicated that "every body movement must be interpreted broadly and in conjunction with every other element in communication".

Many of Ray Birdwhistell's publications were short pieces, gathered together to make up Kinesics and Context.

Ray Birdwhistell viewed communication as a continuous, multichannel process through which and in which social interaction occurs.