Humankind’s first attempts to extend their capabilities must have focused on the use of the body itself. This is Lewis Mumford’s view, articulated in his seminal Technics and Human Development. His argument goes like this:
“Early human beings persistently explored their own organic possibilities and in the process made two discoveries. First, certain bodily actions were intrinsically pleasurable. Such actions tended to be repeated for purely personal reasons. However, prehistoric man also discovered that such deliberately executed movements could serve a social function. Movements that were repeated often enough, in the same location and in the same context of events, began to acquire a communal meaning. In this way, movement became the first form of symbolic communication known to mankind.”
As the symbolic possibilities of the human body were explored, new functions for human movement came into being. As Mumford writes, “Even the hand was no mere horny specialized work-tool: it stroked a lover’s body, held a baby close to the breast, made significant gestures, or expressed in shared ritual and ordered dance some otherwise inexpressible sentiment.”
By asserting that movement is humankind’s original extension system, I am purposefully shifting bodily actions from the biological to the cultural realm. I do not intend to deny the biological bases of human movement. Rather, I want to call attention to the fact that the majority of human motions are not instinctive. Rather, movement is learned behavior acquired within the context of human interactions. This shift positions movement behavior as a meaningful cultural artifact, open to study and interpretation, on par with other non-material extension systems.
It may seem odd to call anything as visceral as physical action “non-material.” Yet, for eons of human history, movement disappeared without a trace, leaving no material artifact behind. Even today, the most important aspect of bodily movement is not the physical act itself but the social meaning it conveys. This is why a gesture of friendship in one part of the world can read as an insult somewhere else!