Do emojis convey our wordless emotions, or perhaps facial expressions? It is safe to say that there is almost no one in the world today who does not use a wide range of emoticons to express themselves. Emojis are essentially pictograms and emoticons used on websites and in electronic messaging. There are around a thousand of these standardized characters that allow for the colorful visual representation of emotions, objects, places, animals, or weather conditions among other things, as part of the text.
Originally Japanese, the international popularity of these characters was made possible by their Unicode standardization and later support for iOS and Android on our devices. Each operating system has its own emoji store with its own unique styles and moods to express the emotion of the moment.
In his study of the hidden meanings of emojis, Keith Broni, editor-in-chief of Emojipedia, points out, “As with language, we should address who we are speaking to before sending them an emoji.”
He then adds:
“People from younger generations are trying to avoid the thumbs-up emoji as they see it as passive-aggressive and a low-effort response.”
A recent survey suggested that people between the ages of 16 and 29 believe that you are “officially old” or a boomer if you use certain emojis, including thumbs-up, red heart, waving hand, or the monkey signs.
In this collection, we showcase trends created specifically by enthusiastic Gen Z users. Maybe your way of using emojis is already “old-fashioned” or even “embarrassing”?
🙃—I’m fine, fine thank you. Meanwhile, your world is falling apart and you’re just pretending to be fine. Whoever gets the message will know something is wrong.
🌚—Express your displeasure if you feel something is really weird or terribly awkward.
🙏—No, we don’t feel like praying when we use this emoji. We use it to express our gratitude and thanks to the other person.
🙂—You might create an old-fashioned and boomer effect with the smiley emoji, since this is now only used ironically. With this you can sarcastically indicate that you have a fake smile on your face.
❤️—Generally still used to express affection, but feel free to use it in arguments and disagreements. It can make your message seem ‘nicer’, for example: No, I totally disagree with you. ❤️
👉🏻👈🏻—Feeling a bit shy in a conversation? Send an emoji like this to communicate you’re shy and timid about a topic or conversation.
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