Meanings
- Of, relating to, using, or accompanied by gesticulation; tending to gesticulate.
He was a prickly, gesticulative, arrogant man, full of acidulous wit […]
1973, Jan Morris, chapter 9, in Heaven’s Command: An Imperial Progress, page 1783 more examples
[…] Mr. Hargrave related, with much humour, the tragic-comic scene which had been performed in his ball the preceding night, declaring, that though he could not but laugh at the recollection of poor M. Bertrand’s gesticulative despair, it had really affected him very differently at the time, and that, all jesting apart, he was very sorry for him.
1843, Frances Milton Trollope, chapter 6, in Hargrave; or, The Adventures of a Man of Fashion, volume 2, page 125[…] the two younger actors, their heads in juxtaposition, were already murmurous with subdued chords of song, which old Joe seemed desirous of smothering under a gesticulative oratory,
1933, Booth Tarkington, chapter 21, in Presenting Lily Mars, page 216There is an old, not specially funny vaudeville act in which the whole troupe builds up and burlesques a dramatic situation simply by different vocal and gesticulative colorations of the word ‘you.’
1941, James Agee, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, pages 465-466Synonyms: gesticulatory
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveOf, relating to, using, or accompanied by gesticulation; tending to gesticulate.
Origin
- Latingesticulor
- Englishgesticulate
- Englishgesticulative
From gesticulate + -ive.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
gesticulative. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gesticulative
“gesticulative.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gesticulative. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “gesticulative,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gesticulative.
Source: gesticulative on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.