In an exclusive interview, Nicki Swift spoke with body language expert Mark Bowden about Prince Harry’s movements and speech in the docuseries. He examined a moment in Episode 2 of “Harry & Meghan” when Harry discussed the treatment that all women marrying into the royal family seem to go through. “As far as my family was concerned, everything that [Meghan] was being put through, they’d been put through as well,” Harry explained, as photos of Princess Diana, Sarah Ferguson, and Kate Middleton appeared on the screen. Without naming names, Harry implied Prince William was unsympathetic, saying, “Why should your girlfriend be treated any differently?” Harry continued: “I said the difference here is the race element.”
Bowden talked about Harry’s “baton gestures” and “illustrators,” referring to Harry’s physical movements as he spoke. Bowden explained that Harry’s movements were “in perfect time with his speech,” which “suggests that he does truly feel that the family saw no difference” in how the women were treated — but that Harry “sees that previous women were being given more status in this false equivalence.”
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Bowden also noted this was “congruent with other elements of the documentary,” where Harry talked about the unfair way his mother, Princess Diana, was treated. While that would not have necessarily had anything to do with race (though probably class), Bowden wondered if Harry thought history repeated itself with Markle. “Psychologically, there may be a deep and understandable desire to retrospectively protect his own mother by protecting his then girlfriend, now wife,” Bowden said.
