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Long before emojis and gifs became the dominant accessories to modern language, there were gestures.

Some are crude, like the middle figure. Others are toxic, like the open-palmed fascist salute. Many, many, many are sexual.

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Gestures can be direct — air quotes, zippering the lips, or flapping one’s arms to suggest someone is a chicken. Like a gif or a face emoji, or the stylized shoulder-shrugger, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, these offer a more or less literal take on the subject matter.

Others are metaphorical, like a finger twirled by the temple to suggest insanity. Some are contradictory, multipurpose or ambiguous, like the hand wave that means both hello and goodbye, or the “thumbs up” that signifies either satisfaction or the desire to hitch a ride. Still others start out literally but take on novel figurative meanings, like the sign of the cross. The eggplant emoji, similarly, was not designed to mean “penis,” but here we are. People are endlessly creative. Meanings shift, in images and gestures just as in words. Keeping track on behalf of a general audience is never easy, and not always even possible.