The article continues a series of papers on communicative semantics of kinesic means of the Russian language. Using the method of semantic communicative analysis the author examines ‘a handshake’ as a kinesic construction and the kineme “offering a hand” as its basic element. She analyzes the most frequent deployments of invariant semantic parameter of this kineme and mentions the issues of semantics of a “broken” (failed) handshake, unusual and abnormal ways of performing the gesture, the problem of aesthetic functions of the kineme “offering a hand” and the construction of a handshake in cinema, etc.