Jeremy Corbyn’s body language resembled a fighter whose legs and strength have gone but who is still leaning on the ropes asking to carry on to the next round.
As he talked about his ‘pride’ and his ‘sadness’ for the people of Britain under a Conservative government, his body language suggested failing bravado and a deep sense of tiredness.
With his head tilted he used the word ‘sadness’ to describe the electorate, but it was a word that clearly resonated with his own emotions about himself and as such it could have been a deflection technique.
His eyes were continually dragging downward as he spoke, looking increasingly reflective as he gazed into what might feel like the pit of his future.
Even the word ‘pride’ became incongruent, with his vocal tone, his words and his facial expressions all performing a ‘dying fall’, i.e. dropping and tapering off as he got to the end of his sentences.
With his eyes cast in a downward direction he began swallowing hard, which can be a symptom of someone fighting back tears, and his small gasping breaths between points suggested the stress response to the night’s disaster for him and his party.
