In the Straight Dope Classic
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/493/is-there-a-word-for-the-jig-you-do-trying-to-get-around-someone-on-the-sidewalk a search for a proper word is launched. Of course, you are all familiar with the famous http://folk.uio.no/alied/TMoL.html where several words that have been lying around for ages are finally given their proper use?
I also want to add a local (i.e. Dutch) anecdote. Before the Dutch claimed lots of land from the sea to form the province of Flevoland, there was an Island called Schokland, of which the inhabitants were called Schokkers, of course. The island is still visible as a small hill in the new landcape and is a Unesco Inheritance site.
At high tide, especially during storms, the water would flood big parts of the island, blocking all roads but one, a wooden pallisade where people had about 2 feet width to cross from the light tower to the village and church. To pass one another they would head straight forward into each others arms, make a half-turn shuffle, and proceed on their way.
This procedure, properly called the Schokker Dance, is at least a good alternative for the inconvenient manoeuvring on the average sidewalk, and also led to rather a lot of marriages in the time, so I’m told. You may give it a try sometime in downtown Chicago. You’ll be surprised
;)
Yes, as referenced by TheMadWoodpusher the sidewalk dance was defined by Douglas Adams in The Menaing of Liff and was called a ‘Droitwich’.
Jink.
Jinking.
Ya jink to the left, and they jink to the left…ya jink to the right, and they jink to the right…sooner or later you both pass each other and disengage jinkage.
I doubt that anything better than “sidewaltz” is going to come up, but if anyone prefers a longer made-up word, that I humbly submit “pavillation,” a portmanteau of pavement and oscillation. One may use a variant to heap scorn on the unfortunate pavillator, accusing him of “pavillanimity.”
The correct term is “kinesic stuttering.”
Dear Cecil:
This behaviour is described in Judith Martin’s book “Miss Manners’, Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behaviour” as THE TURKEY TROT. It never fails to bring a smile to my face.
Sunnyjim
In New Zealand they have a phase at traffic lights where all pedestrians walk at the same time including diagonal crossings.
The system was put in place by a Mr Barnes and the resulting pedestrian collsion avoidance was immediately called the Barnes Dance
I learned this term in a Communications class in college over 20 years ago.
Kinesics is non-verbal “body” language, in this case a quick glance in the other person’s eyes and then a quick glance to the direction we intend to go – but if neither person catches the message because both are glancing away at the same time, the message doesn’t get through. So, we try glancing back and forth between the other person’s eyes and the intended direction again, walking closer all the while, until either the message syncs up and gets through or we have to stop in our tracks to avoid collision.
It was mentioned in class as if it were the commonly-accepted term for it, but a Google search today doesn’t yield many “hits” for it.