handshake vs acknowledgment

handshake and acknowledgment both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
handshake	Yes	No	No	No
acknowledgment	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, acknowledgment is a hypernym of handshake; that is, acknowledgment is a word with a broader meaning than handshake:

handshake: grasping and shaking a person's hand (as to acknowledge an introduction or to agree on a contract)
acknowledgment: a statement acknowledging something or someone

Other hypernyms of handshake include acknowledgement.

handshake (noun)	acknowledgment (noun)
grasping and shaking a person's hand (as to acknowledge an introduction or to agree on a contract)	a statement acknowledging something or someone
	a short note recognizing a source of information or of a quoted passage
	the state or quality of being recognized or acknowledged