pointing, not with finger

[Muehlbauer, Jeff]

Some of the points about 'animism' made by Adrian and Anne are probably very important. There are definitely cultural distinctions between pointing at people and pointing at other things. In my own area back home, you can point at objects or natural things all you want - it's pointing at people that's negative. Thinking about it, I have seen Cree people use their finger(s) in a pointing gesture to indicate landscape features or things like signs of animals. Generally, the pointing is done with all fingers, though, and not just one. There may be some kind of overlap, where the lip gesture has broad use on landscapes, humans, etc., but the hand pointing can only be used for a subset of that.

If Cree people are listening in here, what do you think? Do you feel a difference between pointing at an object or a landscape feature and pointing at a human or animal or sacred place?