Systems and methods for recognizing the gestures of an entity, notably a human being, and, optionally, for controlling an electrical or electronic system or apparatus, are discussed. The system uses sensors that measure signals, preferentially representative of inertial data about the movements of said entity, and implements a process for enriching a dictionary of said gestures to be recognized and a recognition algorithm, for recognition among the classes of gestures in said dictionary. The algorithm implemented is preferably of the dynamic time warping type. The system carries out preprocessing operations, such as the elimination of signals captured during periods of inactivity of the entity, subsampling of the signals, and normalization of the measurements by reduction, and preferentially uses, to classify the gestures, specific distance calculation modes and modes for merging or voting between the various measurements by the sensors.