The Emoji Language – Better or Worse?

The emoji is now embraced by the world. There may have been no more big fuss about it recently, as compared to a few years ago, but it is here. That it has ceased to be the subject of spirited discussions is perhaps proof that the use of emoji has assimilated effectively into the present world culture and is becoming as natural as the air that everyone breathes.

Via smartphones alone, by 2015 some six billion emojis were exchanged each day across social media applications, such a mind-boggling figure. In the first month following the launch of the emoji keyboard in iOS, the uptake of emojis in text and captions on Instagram photos jumped from zero to 10 percent. The figure further accelerated with the incorporation of emoji in Android platforms.

The trend caught on worldwide in 2011 when software industry body Unicode Consortium approved a set of internationally standardized emojis. But even earlier than that, the iPhone had supported an emoji variant of SoftBank’s emoji set since the iOS 2.2 update. Social media became littered with emojis as more and more users apply these in their posts and interactions such that soon nearly half of social media communications contained emoji.

Then various apps started to get in on the trend, promising users free new symbols, icons and style games, and an emoji version of Herman Melville’s classic “Moby Dick,” called “Emoji Dick,” was added to the Library of Congress collection. Then there came the creation of the emoji-only messenger app, “Emojli.”

How did emoji come to be? Where did the first emoji come from? It all started in Japan, when two companies battled it out with each other in the bid to sell pagers to the Japanese masses.

In 1995, Docomo lost a significant amount of business to rival Tokyo Telemessage when the company decided to abandon the cutesy heart symbol character set on newer versions of its pager devices and replace them with icons with more professional aesthetics. In an attempt to regain buyers’ interest, Docomo employee Shigetaka Kurita created the emoji. Inspired by Japanese comics and the success of the heart design of older models of Docomo pagers, Kurita created the emoji with facial expressions to convey feelings where words just wouldn’t do.

The emoji was born in a time when Japanese internet users were having difficulty with new methods of communication due to the snappier, more casual nature of the email. Senders were used to writing long, verbose letters and struggled to successfully convey their feelings using newer media. It appeared that as people adapted to the more casual, quick nature of the email, the text message and the tweet, they have become eager to adopt a speedy, wordless method of communication.

Then, in the summer of 2014 Emojli was released, the emoji-only social network where one will find “no words, no spam, just emoji.” It roused public curiosity. Some might have found it a little strange that a social network banned words, but all the more it worked to draw public attention. Emojli creators Matt Gray and Tom Scott acknowledged the comedy social networking app “Yo” as one of the contributing factors that convinced them to go ahead with creating Emojli, “It came out of two stories: comedy social network Yo, and the Unicode consortium’s new emojis.”

Obviously, emoji can be fast, fun and handy for getting over language barriers. Facial expressions and symbols such as hearts, smiley faces and a pair of lips can mean the same to people of different languages. Rather than type out lengthy words, simply selecting a series of pictures to communicate is a stress-free and quick way.

It isn’t difficult to see why many people find the emoji to be an enjoyable option to spending a significant amount of their day communicating with words. Using pictures instead of words to communicate can also feel like something of a novelty. For people whose jobs involve writing excessively, it’s a relief to be able to resort to emoji when possible.

Some people argue that emoji is a step backwards to the dark ages of illiteracy, making people poorer communicators. They decry the rise of the now omnipresent emoji in people’s daily digital lives. Professional art critic and contrarian Jonathan Jones views emoji as a “huge step back for humanity.” The view is contested by Vyv Evans – professor of linguistics, language and digital communication consultant, and author – who says that “emoji helps flesh out the meanings they bring to light, clarifying, nuancing and adding to the otherwise arid textspeak of our emotionally abbreviated digital tongue.”

But, well, it might still be a better idea to express personal, complex thoughts using words rather than emoji. While a picture can speak a thousand words, that picture can also be interpreted a thousand ways. Spoken communication is more specific and allows people to understand one another more clearly. A string of emoji is unlikely to make an adequate replacement for a detailed verbal description or a poetic love letter.