Thumb, index and middle fingers up, ring and pinkie fingers folded down
Index, middle and ring fingers up, pinkie and thumb folded into palm with thumb over pinkie finger
Middle, ring and pinkie fingers up, index and thumb folded into palm with thumb over index finger
0voters
Asking because on two recent occasions on TV or video, most recently a video I just watched, I saw a count of three displayed on a hand with thumb, index and middle fingers up, ring and pinkie fingers folded down.
That just seems awkward and difficult to manage to me. I have always, from the count of one on, gone index up, then index plus middle, etc., with the rest of the fingers folded in and my thumb folded over on top of the other fingers, which helps hold the other fingers down. The right way, in other words
I’m also including middle, ring and pinkie up, since I think that’s how it’s done in some other countries, and that at least also has the advantage of the thumb helping to hold down the index finger.
Mundane, pointless things I must get an opinion on…
I actually thought this might be about the movie Inglourious Basterds, which features a whole “gave himself away with the wrong three fingers” narrative.
Hmm, interesting. When I was posting this OP, I kind of had a feeling there might have been a meme or something about this, and maybe I had the ‘Inglourious Basterds’ thing in the back of my mind.
As far as the recent examples I saw go, at least the most recent one involved a person who was not Euorpean (at least judging by their American-seeming accent), but may have been Canadian by birth, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the ‘European’ finger display was also a Canadian thing.
This has even been memeified and is used online whenever someone’s turn of phrase, etc. gives away the fact they are not being honest about their identity (e.g. Russian troll pretending to be a MAGA American using an expression an American would never say)
German here; I use thumb-index-middle and have never considered another way. I have never been taught to signify numbers by fingers by anyone, though, and I am not aware that there is an explicitly socially enforced custom. Someone else using other fingers would not look that jarring to me, though - I might not even take notice.
Why thumb-index-middle looks like the most obvious way to me:
I show a number of fingers by quickly counting up to that number with fingers then holding up the hand, never by moving the number of fingers at once. I’d have to rehearse the gesture first else. So e.g. holding up four fingers to me is making a fist, straightening one-two-three-four fingers, then holding up the hand.
The thumb and the index finger (at least to me) are the fingers that I can easiest move independently, i.e. with leaving the other fingers in place. No doubt anyone playing an instrument does not have any issues with moving fingers independently, but I do, and I suspect many others do too. So it feels like the most natural way to me to begin with thumb and index fingers.
In fact when I make a fist then straighten the index finger I cannot keep my thumb from straightening.
By the way there is a hoary old visual joke in Germany involving holding up three or four fingers with
Q: “What is this?”
A: A sawmill worker ordering five glasses of beer.
Actually, ASL (as I’ve used in NY) is Pointer, then Middle, finally Thumb up.
For 4 the Thumb is down, with 4 remining fingers raised. 5 obviously is all fingers up.
6 is Thumb touched to Pinky, 7 is Thumb touched to Ring, 8 is Thumb touching Middle, 9 is Thumb touching Pointer, 10 is only Thumb up.
You can also continue to count to 20 with only 1 hand.
I learned differently. One is ff, 2 is mf, 3 is thumb… and so on.
I think it could be regional or just my teachers method.
Of course all ASL speakers have their own peculiarities.
Just like voice speakers.
I’ve taught my grandkids ASL. The baby twins took my Nana to be banana
So that’s what they sign to me. (It’s a two handed ‘peel the banana’ movement).
Incredibly cute to see their fat little hands doing it.
I was eating a banana the other day, kinda freaked them out.
This begs the question of how one counts to five on their fingers. Is “one” always the index finger? I start with the index finger and work my way over to the pinkie (4) and the thumb is the last (5) to be counted.
Players do this, too. It’s because it’s easier to recognize from farther away. The standard one or two look pretty similar to the left fielder if the right fielder is showing the number of outs. Same if the ump is confirming the count.
But as a German you surely know the joke:
Put you thumb, index and pinkie up and yell into the bar: “Five beers for the crew from the sawmill!”
In the German original: Fünf Bier für die Jungs von die Sägerei!
Not necessarily: I believe it is in Japan where you start with the pinkie (it may have been China, it was also a story about spies being discoverd, but a long time ago, I forgot which side was which)
