I’m very excited to have a post up on Strong Language, the Internet’s premium blog about the linguistics of swearing (it is, on the whole, pretty NSFW).

My first post is about the ‘Up Yours’ gesture common to the UK, Australia and New Zealand, but generally unknown to North Americans. It’s a very updated version of this post that I wrote in 2012. One major update is evidence to support the idea that Churchill knew he was flipping people off when using the Up Yours gesture instead of the Peace Sign:

Some argue that his aristocratic background meant that he was unaware of the primary meaning of the palm-inward version in Britain and was innocently performing it like many other Europeans.

The more likely explanation is that Churchill was all too aware of the meaning of this gesture. John Colville, Churchill’s private secretary, noted in his diaries that “The PM *will* give the V-sign with two fingers in spite of representations repeatedly made to him that this gesture has quite another significance”.

Cross-cultural variation in insulting gestures is always one of my favourite topics, I’m sure you’ll see me posting more about it on Strong Language in the future.