The body language of authority

In 5 seconds In Chinese martial arts, authority is demonstrated through the body, not by one's social or professional status. But how to maintain it?
In her doctoral dissertation, Chendan Cui-Laughton highlighted a graduated hierarchy of communicative practices for establishing authority: verbal assertions, visual demonstrations, master demonstrations, and test touch. Rival touch represents the most intense form of communication.

How is authority established in an organization where degrees and titles matter less than mastery expressed through the body?

That's what Université de Montréal communications student Chendan Cui-Laughton explores via the Chinese martial arts, in a doctoral dissertation co-supervised by professors Boris Brummans and François Cooren.

Between 2016 and 2019, Cui-Laughton logged more than 400 hours of observation over 97 days in a tai-chi organization in Zhengzhou, China, documenting how authority is constructed and transmitted. 

Her study, published in Management Communication Quarterly, develops the concept of differential authority to explain how legitimacy is achieved through body practices in  lineage-based organizations.

 

Radiating in concentric circles

Differential authority draws on a social model called chaxugeju, developed by Chinese sociologist Fei Xiaotong in the 1940s, which conceives of social relationships in China as spreading outward from the self, like ripples around a stone thrown into water.

“People with authority exude a certain force,” said Cooren. “The closer you are to them, the more you yourself are imbued with authority, which is why it’s important to be near people with power to show your affiliation with them.”

In traditional Chinese martial arts organizations, “authority is not granted through institutional position or personal charisma alone, as in Max Weber’s typology,” the co-authors explain in their study.

“It must be enacted through repeatable practices that authenticate one’s status as a legitimate vector—a conveyor of lineage knowledge.”

Chendan Cui-Laughton performs the "Hold the Moon in Your Arms" pose with a tai chi ball, a routine created by Master Gang Huang, founder of the Gou Xuan Tai Chi Academy. Trained in the Chen style at the Dongwu Tai Chi Research Institute, she has been perfecting this technique for three years during her stays in China.

Showing, not telling

The study describes how differential authority is exercised through two key body practices: demonstrations by the master and “testing touch” during instruction.

The master’s demonstrations are structured performances in which the master executes tai chi movements before the students. “Verbal explanations are the starting point, but then it has to be shown,” Brummans said.

Testing touch is the other core component of differential authority. “This refers to the interactive physical engagement through which practitioners experience and evaluate specific martial-arts techniques,” Cui-Laughton explained.

“It’s the difference between seeing and experiencing it yourself,” Brummans added. “This is where differential authority is felt and transforms the people exposed to it. They want to become part of the organization and submit to the master’s authority.”

 

Two types of touch

Cui-Laughton identified two recurring forms of testing touch: curious exploration and rivalrous touch.

Curious exploration is typically performed by students who approach testing with a combination of motivation and scepticism. For example, in 2016 Cui-Laughton observed a tai chi novice ask to “try out” her master. For three minutes, she tried to move him, and he resisted only with his right hand. 

“While he remained mountain-solid, her body swayed like a willow in the wind,” Cui-Laughton recorded in her notes. The student said she was impressed by the master’s control and sensed his authority.

Cui-Laughton had a similar experience. “In 2003, when I was a beginner, I put my master to the test—and failed, like many others,” she related. “I knew from the start that I would; I was just motivated by curiosity and wanting to understand what his level meant. He didn’t hurt me—he could have—and that bolstered my trust in him.”

Rivalrous touch, the other form of testing touch, refers to competitive physical encounters in which individuals challenge the master’s authority, often driven by ego or inter-institutional rivalry. 

In her dissertation, Cui-Laughton describes an incident in which a visitor from Uzbekistan, after defeating two young trainee instructors, returned to practice in the organization’s space as if the students weren’t there. “A senior instructor stepped in to restore the organization’s authority,” she recalled.

François Cooren, professor in the department of communication at Université de Montréal

Establishing authority

Cui-Laughton delineated a hierarchy of communicative practices by which authority is established: verbal claims, visual demonstrations (e.g. images or videos), demonstrations by the master and, lastly, testing touch.

Of them all, rivalrous touch is the most intense.

“The body and the movement speak for themselves through the felt experience,” Cooren explained. “Authority is conveyed through the demonstration of bodily ability.”

In traditional Chinese martial arts, there is no system of coloured belts as in Western martial arts. While a grading system known as duanwei (段位) has been introduced and promoted within the martial-arts community, in everyday practice these titles rarely determine authority.

“What matters is skill, not the symbolism of a belt,” Cui-Laughton explained. “What counts is how you practice your art, your dedication, perseverance and physical mastery.”

The legitimacy of authority is therefore relational and based on practice rather than standardized or visually codified systems, she said.

Cui-Laughton learned that masters may establish their own school only after demonstrating they are as skilled as their own original masters. “It’s a negotiation between lineage and distinctiveness,” Brummans observed. “It’s like jazz: freedom in the groove.”

Boris Brummans, professor in the department of communication at Université de Montréal

Martial arts and beyond

Brummans and Cooren believe their study has implications beyond martial arts.

“Chendan’s dissertation demonstrates how authority is embodied in everyday interactions in a setting little known to the West,” Brummans said. “It makes us realize how the authority we observe in organizations is on the surface. This study shows we need to look beyond what we see, beneath what is formalized.”

The concept of differential authority provides a lens for exploring other organizational contexts in which knowledge is transmitted through contact and sustained co-presence, he added. “A doctor has a degree, but it is also through their actions, their way of examining or touching their patients’ bodies, that their authority is manifested and felt."

By incorporating an ancient Chinese theory into organizational communication research, the study addresses calls to revisit this field of study, Brummans said. “Words have value, but in martial arts and many other fields, it is through the body that authority is transmitted."

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