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According to Gumperz (1982), our ability to communicate with others depends on 'shared interpretive conventions' (p. 3). To make sense of talk between people, communicators must have language-based and socio-cultural knowledge that allows them to use information in and around an utterance to help choose from an array of meanings that could be given to that utterance. This convention-based view of communicative practice becomes complicated when applied to the use and understanding of nonverbal cues, however, because not all nonverbal [1] behaviors require interpretive processes (i.e., when the tie between an action and its referent is automatic; Buck & VanLear, 2001). Nonetheless, many nonverbal cues that occur in communicative contexts are, like language, open to a range of meaning attributions and necessitate communicators understanding the set of interpretations that may he attached to the cues through contextualized and conventionalized practice (Burgoon, 1994; Goodwin, 1981; LeBaron, 2005; Manusov, 2002; Smith, 1995).
One way to think about conventional interpretive practices is with the idea of framing. Frames are definitions for communicative events that guide our subjective involvement (Goffman, 1974). According to Gumperz (1982), frames 'enable us to distinguish among permissible interpretive options ... [and the] typifications reflected in ... interpretive frames derived from previous interactive experience are the foundations of the practical reasoning processes on which we rely in the conduct of our affairs' (pp. 21-22). Thus, a way to make sense of the meanings given to communicative acts--and to understand the larger conventions within which the meanings are embedded--is to assess the underlying frames that support certain meanings for potentially ambiguous cues.
Although many interpersonal communication researchers understand the importance of framing as a means by which people make sense of specific interpersonal behaviors, events, and relationships (e.g., Dillard, Solomon, & Samp, 1996; Koerner & Fitzpatrick, 2002; Planalp [2], 1985), media theorists have thus far discussed framing much more expansively. According to Entman (1993), 'the concept of [media] framing ... offers a way to describe the power of a communicating text' (p. 51). Specifically,
[t]o frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation for the items described. (Entman, 1993, p. 52, emphasis in original)
For media framing theorists (e.g., Iyengar, 1991; Kahneman & Tversky, 1984; Pan & Kosicki, 1993), the results of framing--or choosing certain things to talk about and particular ways to talk about them within texts--is the creation or reinforcement of what is or should be salient to an audience, how that audience should evaluate the thing being framed, and, possibly, a move to get the audience to undertake some action related to what has been framed. Although texts (e.g., news coverage) are embedded in a set of institutional practices that may constrain them (Tuchman, 1978), they can also work to construct a reality for those who attend to those texts. In this way, news media are seen as active participants in a larger social drama (Baym, 2000; Ettema, 1990; Vande Berg, 1995), promoting particular performances and not others.
One way to look further into the frames used in meanings given to nonverbal behavior is located in media discourse about nonverbal cues. Jaworski and Galasinski (2002) referred to the particular set of flames that encompass media talk about communication as metapragmatics. They argued that such metapragmatic flaming is a useful way to view the textual presentation of nonverbal cues:
[T]he relative indeterminacy and immediacy of non-verbal behaviour (e.g., facial expressions and gestures) accounts for the great ease with which the media, as well as the social actors in non-institutional, face-to-face contexts can and do use metapragmatic manipulation of non-verbal behaviour ... It is often the verbal accounts of non-verbal behaviour that we rely on in disambiguating and/or imposing preferred interpretations on the non-verbal medium. (Jaworski & Galasinski, 2002, pp. 630, 634)
The authors used this argument to investigate several British newspapers' coverage of Clinton's nonverbal communication during his grand jury testimony regarding his relationship with Monica Lewinski. They found, among other things, tremendous variety in the interpretations of (or meaning given to) Clinton's nonverbal behaviors by different newspapers, and these presentations of the behaviors largely mirrored the political orientation of the sources.
Viewing the representation of, or metapragmatics for, nonverbal communication in media texts is helpful for a number of reasons. First, examining the meanings given to nonverbal cues by the media shows potential ways in which audiences are likely to think about the communicative ability of the cues. In searching for evidence of frames in media discourse, interpersonal scholars may also find evidence of conventionalized flames reflecting everyday understandings of what nonverbal cues may mean. Second, investigating potentially diverse media coverage of a nonverbal event allows us to think more about the choice making behind how we use nonverbal behaviors
Although the list of possible meanings given to nonverbal cues is numerous, media discussions--particularly those that may be affected by politics and perspective--provide a largely untapped resource for increasing awareness of the repertoire of conventionalized meanings for nonverbal cues. The primary aim of this study, however, is not to use the discourse to find evidence of political perspective, as was the case for Jaworski and Galasinski (2002), although such a goal is laudable (and, although, discussion of political views occurs in our data). Nor are we concerned primarily with looking at the media texts as representations of culture. Rather, we are interested more generally with broadening the database from which we can learn about nonverbal cues by discerning the general flames, and within these, the meanings, given to nonverbal cues.
Specifically, we argue that an understanding of flaming can help link the processes involved in both interpersonal and media-based interpretations of nonverbal cues. Such a goal is consistent with calls to integrate better the interpersonal and mass communication literatures (e.g., Berger & Chaffee, 1988; Caplan, 2001; O'Sullivan, 1999; Reardon & Rogers, 1988; Rogers, 1999; Rubin & Rubin, 1985; Wiemann, Hawkins, & Pingree, 1988) and to reach across communication subdisciplines more generally. A flaming perspective, particularly the well-developed one used by many media scholars, also provides an opportunity to reveal conventionalized 'organizing principles' (Bartlett, 1932) within which specific meanings for nonverbal cues may be understood. Given the importance of media for socializing people into the use of nonverbal behavior (Coats, Feldman, & Philippot, 1999), specifically enactments of emotional expression (Zillmann, 1991), and the limited discussion attempting to capture the myriad media messages that may be attributed to nonverbal action (Jaworski & Galasinski, 2002), these goals seem an important step in understanding more fully the nature of interpreting nonverbal actions.
In this study, we use metapragmatic discourse about the 1993 handshake (and other nonverbal cues surrounding the handshake) between Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat that was 'guided by' Bill Clinton to assess the frames (and within those frames, the meanings) given to the nonverbal cues that occurred in and around this event. Specifically, we analyze English-language Israeli and Palestinian press coverage, and translations of Israeli Hebrew and Palestinian Arabic coverage, to assess the interpretive frames given to this oft-described 'historic' nonverbal event. We do so with two purposes: (1) to provide evidence of conventionalized media frames for nonverbal interaction behavior; and (2) to assess some meanings for nonverbal cues that occur within these frames. Doing so, however, requires greater awareness (and framing) of the event itself and the cultural and political climates in which the media accounts are embedded.
The Event
The handshake between Rabin and Arafat took place before a long-lasting backdrop of violence between Israelis and Palestinians (CNN, 2003). The unrest between the two peoples had become normative since the founding of the Israeli state in 1948 and, whereas a substantial peace movement existed within Israel at the time of the handshake, most Israelis and Palestinians did not have much hope for a peaceful end to the complex conflict. The issues at stake were never as clear-cut as the Western media portrayed. The basic foundation of the conflict found its feet on one small and coveted piece of land split by outside European interests between two peoples. For the most part, Israelis saw their return to Israel as a return to their historic Jewish homeland, a place of safety that was thought especially necessary following the Holocaust. And, for the most part, Arab countries saw the Israelis' arrival as another wave of colonization. Following several wars waged and lost by Arab countries against Israel, Palestinians began their own uprising on the ground in the form...
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