raised hand
1
2.5
- noun
:
mano levantada
- Wendy started to say something, but Marissa hushed her with a raised hand, indicating Cyrill had answered.
Examples
-
A flock of pigeons perched on the chairman's raised hand and forearm.
Fiction book (1996) -
Rosemary opened her mouth to protest, but her mother's slightly raised hand stopped her.
Fiction book (1991) -
Too late, I saw her raised hand.
Fiction book (1994) -
His raised hand seemed especially large, and his smile was proud.
Fiction book (1992) -
When she didn't see any more raised hands, she turned to me.
Fiction book (1993) -
He could only nod in the direction of another raised hand.
Fiction book (1996) -
He sang with them for the first chorus, and then, with a raised hand, led them through the second, coming back in on a word here and there.
Fiction book (1992) -
A student walks into the café and waves at Setterholm, who immediately waves her raised hand and smiles back.
Blog text (12) -
During the meeting, she raised hand to signal that she wanted to speak.
-
The teacher noticed several raised hands in the classroom, indicating students wanted to answer.
How Clear
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'an act of lifting one's hand to signal...' is directly and transparently derived from combining 'raise' (to lift) with 'hand' (the body part), forming a literal description of the action. This compositional, gesture-based phrase is cross-linguistically common and follows normal noun phrase formation, so a B1 learner who knows both words can readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Raised hand comes from classrooms and meetings where a person lifts their hand into the air to show they want 'to speak', 'to answer', or 'to vote'. So, the clear picture of a lifted hand explains why a raised hand means a signal that someone wants to speak or show agreement.