The Naked Face By Malm Gladwell Analysis

In his article “The Naked Face,” Malcom Gladwell outlines Ekman’s psychological view of face reading. The well renowned psychologist believes that the face is the best evidence a person has to offer about their emotions because most facial expressions are not made consciously. The face can be unpacked by every separate expression that pertains to a universal meaning. On the other end of the spectrum, the semiotic view proposed by Wierzbicka’s sees the face as a network of signs. And while there can still be universal meanings in facial expressions, this view is more aimed towards how the signs of the face interact with each other and the environment to create a unique meaning. Pierce shows how signs can interact with each other in his article “What is a Sign?”, which can be applied while reading the face. One similarity of these views is …show more content…
Each micro expression of the face can be tied to an exact meaning which correlates with a mental process. Face reading has an advantage over verbal communications because these miniscule expressions cannot be consciously controlled, and therefore have direct connotations to mental processes. Ekman found about three thousand micro expressions to which he could assign specific connotations and called them by a numbered action-unit. All these action units catalogue the “essential repertoire of human emotion” (Gladwell). This is not to say that the three thousand action units explain every human emotion, in the psychological view of the face, only expressions that have specific and universal denotations can be considered an action unit. The other micro expressions are inessential in the psychological view because they are too ambiguous and require more than a single micro expression to understand. The action units are separate from each other, but different combinations of them can go beyond processes and show the actual conscious intent of a