![Choque de puños](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1e/Choque_de_pu%C3%B1os.jpg)
A fist bump (also known as a bro fist or power five
) is a
gesture similar in meaning to a
handshake
A handshake is a globally widespread, brief greeting or parting tradition in which two people grasp one of each other's like hands, in most cases accompanied by a brief up-and-down movement of the grasped hands. Customs surrounding handshakes a ...
or
high five High five is a friendly gesture in which one individual slaps another's hand.
High five (and variants such as Hi5, Hi-5, and Hi-Five) may also refer to:
Music
* Hi-5 (Australian group), an Australian children's musical group
* Hi-5 (Greek band), ...
. A fist bump can also be a symbol of giving respect or approval, as well as companionship between two people. It can be followed by various other hand and body gestures (such as immediately opening the palm and spreading the fingers for “knucks with explosions”) and may be part of a
dap greeting
Dap or the dap is a friendly gesture of greeting, agreement, or solidarity between two people that has become popular in Western cultures, particularly since the 1970s, originating from African American communities.Dalzell, Tom (2009). The Routle ...
. It is commonly used in sports as a form of celebration with teammates and with opposition players at the beginning or end of a game. Fist bumps are often given as a form of friendly congratulation.
Definition
A fist bump is a gesture in which two people bump their
fist
A fist is the shape of a hand when the fingers are bent inward against the palm and held there tightly. To make or clench a fist is to fold the fingers tightly into the center of the palm and then to clamp the thumb over the middle phalanges; in ...
s together (as in greeting or celebration).
The gesture is performed when two participants each form a closed fist with one hand and then lightly tap the front of their fists together. A participant's fists may be either vertically oriented (perpendicular to the ground) or horizontally oriented. Unlike the standard handshake, which is typically performed only with each participant's right hand, a fist bump may be performed with participants using either hand.
History
The "fist bump" or "pound" in European history can be traced to boxers instructed to touch gloves at the start of a contest.
Sports Pundit Likewise, dart players bump fists that are clutching pointed mini-arrows. The modern gesture may have arisen spontaneously on city basketball courts, and was popularized by basketball player
Fred Carter
Fredrick James Carter (born February 14, 1945), nicknamed "Mad Dog" or "Doggy", is an American former professional basketball player and coach, who played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) for eight seasons (1969– 77) for the Balti ...
in the 1970s.
Others trace the gesture to the
Wonder Twins
The Wonder Twins (Zan & Jayna) are a fictional extraterrestrial twin brother and sister superhero duo who first appeared in Hanna-Barbera's American animated cartoon, animated television series ''The All-New Super Friends Hour''. The pair can act ...
, minor characters in the 1970s
Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc. ( ) was an American animation studio and production company which was active from 1957 to 2001. It was founded on July 7, 1957, by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera following the decision of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to c ...
superhero cartoon ''
Super Friends
''Super Friends'' is an American animated television series about a team of superheroes, which ran from 1973 to 1985 on ABC as part of its Saturday-morning cartoon lineup. It was produced by Hanna-Barbera and was based on the Justice League of ...
'', who touched knuckles and cried "Wonder Twin powers, activate!"
Baseball Hall of Famer
Stan Musial used the fist bump during the 1950–60s as an alternative to shaking hands. Musial was convinced that he was catching too many colds by picking up germs while shaking thousands of hands each year, so he adopted the fist bump as a friendly alternative.
Smithsonian researcher LaMont Hamilton suggests that the dap originated during the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
as a modified form of the
Black Power salute, which was prohibited by the
US military
The United States Armed Forces are the Military, military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six Military branch, service branches: the United States Army, Army, United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps, United States N ...
.
Pat Benatar
Patricia Mae Giraldo (''née'' Andrzejewski, formerly Benatar; born January 10, 1953), known professionally as Pat Benatar, is an American rock singer and songwriter. In the United States, she has had two multi-platinum albums, five platinum alb ...
is seen giving another dancer a fist bump at the end of her 1983 video for the song "
Love Is a Battlefield
"Love Is a Battlefield" is a song by American singer Pat Benatar, recorded and released on September 12, 1983, as a single from Benatar's live album '' Live from Earth'' (1983), though the song itself was a studio recording. It was written by Ho ...
."
The fist bump was seen in Australia in September 1990 at the Wetherill Park Indoor Cricket Centre between two opening batsmen, Mick Tyler and Bob Minney. At the completion of the first successful batting over for the pair, they met mid-pitch and fist bumped with their batting gloves. They continued to fist bump for the remainder of the game and it continued into the future. Now this act can be seen on various sporting fields/arenas around Australia, and it is now commonly practiced at an international level; many international cricketers fist bump in between overs or as congratulations after a six has been hit.
![Tingler Benavides fist bumps](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f6/Tingler_Benavides_fist_bumps.jpg)
In light of the
2009 H1N1 pandemic
The 2009 swine flu pandemic, caused by the H1N1 influenza virus and declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) from June 2009 to August 2010, is the third recent flu pandemic involving the H1N1 virus (the first being the 1918–1920 Span ...
, the Dean of Medicine at the
University of Calgary
The University of Calgary (U of C or UCalgary) is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University of Calgary started in 1944 as the Calgary branch of the University of Alberta, founded in 1908, prior to being ins ...
, Tom Feasby, suggested that the fist bump may be a "nice replacement of the handshake" in an effort to prevent transmission of the virus. Similarly, a medical study has found that fist bumps and
high five High five is a friendly gesture in which one individual slaps another's hand.
High five (and variants such as Hi5, Hi-5, and Hi-Five) may also refer to:
Music
* Hi-5 (Australian group), an Australian children's musical group
* Hi-5 (Greek band), ...
s spread fewer germs than
handshake
A handshake is a globally widespread, brief greeting or parting tradition in which two people grasp one of each other's like hands, in most cases accompanied by a brief up-and-down movement of the grasped hands. Customs surrounding handshakes a ...
s.
Fist bumping behavior has also been observed in
chimpanzee
The chimpanzee (''Pan troglodytes''), also known as simply the chimp, is a species of great ape native to the forest and savannah of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed subspecies. When its close relative th ...
s, according to a book written by Margaret Power in 1991.
[Power, Margaret (1991). ''The Egalitarians – Human and Chimpanzee: An Anthropological View of Social Organization''. Cambridge University Press. .]
The
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...
has made the fist bump a common greeting, as shaking hands was discouraged to slow the spread of the virus.
Hygiene
Because reduced skin contact results in reduced bacterial transfer, a 2014 study
has recommended that the fist bump and
high five High five is a friendly gesture in which one individual slaps another's hand.
High five (and variants such as Hi5, Hi-5, and Hi-Five) may also refer to:
Music
* Hi-5 (Australian group), an Australian children's musical group
* Hi-5 (Greek band), ...
be adopted as a more hygienic alternative to the
handshake
A handshake is a globally widespread, brief greeting or parting tradition in which two people grasp one of each other's like hands, in most cases accompanied by a brief up-and-down movement of the grasped hands. Customs surrounding handshakes a ...
.
References
Further reading
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fist Bump
Greetings
Hand gestures
Nonverbal communication