The Naan Bread has started waving, and granddad is excited. Over the course of a week, senior waved at junior every time they passed one another. At the start of the week Naan Bread just looked on impassively, by the end of the week he waved back.
What happened here? Why does a baby wave? Has he learned the social function of the gesture? Is he imitating his grandfather? Partly for sure, but to see him do it you would think there were somehow more to it than that. Imitation suggests something that is (at least at first) external; something that one is trying out. The Naan Bread's waving seems more organic than that. That is, when he waves, it seems that the action he is learning comes partly from his efforts to copy his grandfather, and partly from something he simply feels the need to do. What is it about waving that a baby already knows to do, or wants to do?
Looking at Naan Bread, it seems that waving is only partly a gesture, something intended for the benefit of someone else; extending an arm and waggling it for a communicative purpose. Before waving comes reaching, something we do mainly for ourselves. Reaching isn't really social. Reaching in babies can be positively anti social. "I want THAT. I need it". Arm out, grab it. If I can get it then great. If I can't, then I might scream in uncontrolled indignation.
Babies want stuff (food, toys, hot cups of tea), but they also want people. "There's MUMMY!" *reach*. You might reach too, if you couldn't say something along the lines of "come over here a minute, I'd like a word". Naan Bread was reaching for people quite some time before he was waving at them. "You there, hey you!" What it looked like to me, when he started waving proper, was that suddenly, this extended arm didn't need to come into contact with its target to garner some satisfaction.
Reaching becomes waving when, instead of successfully grasping a thing, you realise you can flap your hand in its direction and still get a reaction. Admittedly food and toys do not respond (it is still necessary to reach for them), but over time you come to see that people wave back! How great is that? Partial gratification from an action you already had basically down.
