This question was triggered by What does the gesture to touch the side of your nose with a forefinger mean? but it is generally referring to any question about gestures.
Are those questions on-topic on EL&U?
To me, they don't seem on-topic, in the same way questions about sign language are not on-topic. The reason is that the question is not about English language, and without a specific context being given, in some cases there are more than one possible answer.
I'd like to throw a few thoughts on the matter, although for now I'm not sure whether we should accept or not.
Gestures are certainly an important part for communicating, as much as intonation or body movement. The intonation field is treated in Linguistics studies, for example.
Anyway, there are some gestures that are international, but some are peculiar to a given nation and some of them even only to certain regions. But even though all of these are important in helping the utterance having its desired effect on the interlocutor, they might get interpreted and that's the problem.
I think that most of them might generate discussions and debates. I'd add them to the "on-topic park" but first we have to consider that they're not a definite field, at least for some of them. And even grammar, that is kind of stricter and more definite, generates debates sometimes.
So, should we consider as on-topic questions like:
... etc.
I immediately thought it was off-topic and was about to post the following comment there:
Gestures are off-topic. They are a form of limited communication, but barely language and it's not even part of a sign language. They are not connected in anyway with English language, though particular ones may be associated with particular English culture. Even so, there is nothing connecting them with English as a language.
But on reflection, I have the usual misgivings. It is an interesting question; it -is- about communication; the question is substantive; where else could one imagine a question like that being asked and answered so well; the question and existing answers are already high voted.
None of these reasons are part of the ELU mandate, they're all secondary. And there are other questions that meet all of these too but are easily closable.
I like this question and it's not frivolous or poor or badly intended. But it's very questionable.
If the gesture in question is made by an English speaking person, I think it falls easily into the scope of this site. If a word is spoken, written, hand signed or gestured, it's still a word. I'm not saying we should open up to all ASL, that could be an entire site, but gestures made by English speakers would probably fit here better than anywhere else on the web.
