Tongue - Cultural Aspects

Cultural Aspects

Sticking one's tongue out at someone is considered a childish gesture of rudeness and/or defiance in many countries; the act may also have sexual connotations, depending on the way in which it is done. However, in Tibet it is considered a greeting. A farmer from Fabriano, Italy was convicted and fined by the country's highest court for sticking his tongue out at a neighbor with whom he had been arguing. Proof of the affront had been captured with a cell phone camera. Blowing a raspberry can also be meant as a gesture of derision.

Body art
Being a cultural custom for long time, tongue piercing and splitting has become quite common in western countries in recent decades, with up to one-fifth of young adults having at least one piece of body art in the tongue.

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