Namaste is a respectful Hindu greeting used at any time of day, often said with a slight bow and palms pressed together at the chest. The word combines namas, meaning bow or homage, with te, meaning to you, so it literally means bowing to you. In Hinduism it carries the sense that the divine self is present in both people. The word appears in the Rigveda and later texts as a form of worship and salutation, and terracotta figures from the Indus Valley civilisation show people in a similar folded-hands posture. The same gesture, called Añjali Mudrā, appears in classical Indian dance, yoga and temple sculpture. Namaste is also used by Buddhists and Jains.

In 1909 D. W. Griffith made a 14-minute film about a speculator who corners the wheat market and doubles the price of bread. A farmer sows his field while a 'Wheat King' gambles in the Chicago wheat pit; bakers raise the loaf from five cents to ten and the poor line up for bread. Griffith cut back and forth between the farm, the feast and the breadline, a technique called parallel editing, so audiences saw both ends of the economy at once. The film drew on Frank Norris's stories and on a real scheme: months earlier Chicago financier James Patten had cornered wheat, sent bread prices up and made about $5 million, roughly $185 million today.