gesture
noun · verb
Simple meaning
Motion of hands or body to emphasize or help to express a thought or feeling.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
jehscherSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈdʒɛstʃɚ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
Motion of hands or body to emphasize or help to express a thought or feeling
A motion of the limbs or body, especially one made to emphasize speech.
graphical user interface
A motion made with a pointing device, or on a touchscreen, that is recognised by the system as a command.
An act or a remark that serves as a formality or as a sign of attitude.
verb
intransitive
To make a gesture or gestures.
transitive
To express or signal (to someone) by a gesture or gestures (to do something, go somewhere, etc).
transitive
To accompany or illustrate with gesture or action.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C1 · Advanced
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Motion of hands or body to emphasize or help to express a thought or feeling
Used this way, gesture is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Nearby words
- gesticulation , rarer, so it draws attention
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use gesture
- “He gestured his desire to leave.”verb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A gesture executed with the facial muscles.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.