The invention relates to a system and method for recognizing gestures of an entity, in particular a human being, and optionally controlling an electrical or electronic apparatus or system. The invention uses sensors which measure signals, said signals preferably being representative of inertial data on the movements of said entity, and implements a process for developing a dictionary of said gestures to be recognized and an algorithm for recognition from among the classes of gestures of said dictionary. The implemented algorithm is preferably a dynamic time warping algorithm. The system of the invention implements preprocessing such as the removal of signals sensed during periods of inactivity of the entity, subsampling the signals, and normalizing the measurements by means of reduction, and preferably uses, for classifying gestures, specific distance-calculating modes and merging or voting modes among the various measurements of the sensors.