Authored by: NematodeSeth.

Bowing has been around for quite some time. And is used at the end of performances, to greetings, departures, and even worship. In this article I will examine the act of bowing.

Firstly, I will start off with bowing as a form of worship. More often than not, bowing as a form of worship is done in front of a statue of some sort. For example, Buddhist monks bowing to statues of The Buddha. Now at first glance (specifically from a Christian stand-point.) This act of bowing in front of a statue is breaking some rules in the 10 Commandments. Most of the time when a Christian or such sees a Buddhist monk bowing in front of a statue of The Buddha, they get the idea that the monk is worshiping The Buddha. Now I myself have some problems with monks bowing to statues of The Buddha. But what it is supposed to symbolize (or at least in some sects of Buddhism) is they are not bowing to The Buddha per sa, but rather to the knowledge Buddha had. They are remembering the knowledge The Buddha spoke of, rather than himself.  Or sometimes they are “humbling themselves” to the knowledge Buddha had.

Which brings me to my next topic. Bowing to man. There are quite a few movies where a character says “I bow to no man” or something along those lines. But what does it really mean? Bowing to worship? (As seen in Riddick, 300, ect) Or bowing as a greeting, or a sign of gratitude? In Asia, bowing is the equivalent to handshakes in the western world. Over there, bowing may possibly be seen as an act of humbleness, which, that trait is held in high light over there.  The act of bowing to another person is supposed to portray that you are able to give up just enough of your pride to resort to the act of bowing to them.

Now as I mentioned earlier, the act of bowing was most used during times of worshiping idols, and since that was such, bowing to something is supposed to portray that you have a great deal of respect for the thing you are bowing to.

Which brings me to this question. Would bowing be a great idea to use in America? In America we commonly use the handshake. Which is almost the opposite of bowing. For bowing is used to show humbleness, whilst the handshake is used to show dominance. In America, a strong grip in a handshake shows great dominance, confidence, control, etc. The act of a handshake at first greeting is almost used to get an immediate impression of somebody. If their handshake is strong, it implies the person has confidence. If the handshake is weak, it may imply the person lacks confidence, or is just apathetic.

So would it be better to switch from using the handshake as a form of greeting (which subtly declares dominance or intimidation.) to using the bow, which would declare humility?  In truth it would be hard for the bow to become popularized in America, because as mentioned before, it has been linked to submission to idols, or idol worship. But if America turns to a humble-based greeting, farewell, or sign of gratitude, instead of a dominance-based one, how would that affect the  culture or mind? Would it make people more “weak” or would it actually introduce humbleness?

In reality, bowing as a sign of humbleness is already in America. It is most often used at the end of theatrical productions. But it was also used in the last few centuries as a greeting, before it changed to the handshake.  At the end of theatrical productions, the actors normally bow to the audience, possibly to show gratitude that the audience came to see them.

With bowing in America already established, and actually used quite a lot in America’s past, what would be the impact of bowing being used more universally as it is in Asia? Maybe eventually bowing will make a bigger come back. And we shall see the impact it has on the populace.