There's a lot I think respect is not quite the right word. Is it? I personally see the kiss on the hand as your delicate and you're more, you're more special. And we're going to wrap you with, you know, with bubble wrap and what have you said. That's why I don't buy it. But again, you see that movement in the US of the handshake. The Quakers had something to do with the prominence of the handshake in the US. It was kind of trying to be gone with the British monarchy and this idea that we're all equal.
Friends do it, strangers do it and so do chimpanzees - and it's not just deeply embedded in our history and culture, it may even be written in our DNA. The humble handshake, it turns out, has a rich and surprising history. In this week's episode palaeoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to science broadcaster Helen Czerski about a funny and fascinating voyage of discovery - from the handshake's origins (at least seven million years ago) all the way to its sudden disappearance in March 2020.
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