Physiognomy personality. Physiognomy is also sometimes referred to as anthroposcopy, though the expression was more common in the 19th century when the word originated. Notions of the relationship between an individual's outward appearance and inner character are historically ancient, and occasionally appear in early Greek poetry. Siddhars from ancient India are also known to have defined "samudrika lakshanam" that identifies personal characteristics with body features. Chinese physiognomy or face reading ("mianxiang") reaches back at least to the Northern Song period. The first indications of a developed physiognomic theory appear in fifth century BC Athens, with the works of Zopyrus (who was
Body language movement of any part of the body or the body as a whole; in layman's terms, it is the study of body language. However, Ray Birdwhistell, who is considered the founder of this area of study, never used the term "body language", and did not consider it appropriate. He argued that what can be conveyed with the body does not meet the linguist's definition of language. 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