Books by David (University of Chicago) McNeill

This unique contribution to the field builds upon decades of research and presents a compelling new perspective on speech and gesture. Why We Gesture brings gestures to the fore, countering the traditional view that they are simply add-ons with a decorative function. McNeill's central idea is that gestures orchestrate speech.

Written by one of the pioneers of the field, this is the first book to explain how speech and gesture evolved together into a system that all humans possess. David McNeill challenges the popular 'gesture-first' theory and proposes a groundbreaking theory of the evolution of language.