Unique Free Articles for your Website | Enhancing Text with Symbolic Emoticons

Enhancing Text with Symbolic Emoticons

Filed Under Arts & Entertainment |




by Heather Simpson

Smileys and emoticons are used in written forms of communication to describe a particular emotion or mood that is within the message that is sent. They consist of eyes formed by colons (or semicolons to show winking) and mouths formed by various letters or symbols ranging from a D to symbolize a large smile or a left hand parentheses to express sadness. Here are several example: : ( ; ) : D.

The difference between the two is that smileys use purely text characters while the second group are pictures of little yellow faces which express the same emotions of the text smiles but without the usage of text based characters. Such little pictures can be had from smileyCentral.

These symbolic expressions have risen to prominence thanks to rise of text messaging, not just on cell phones, but also through instant messaging or message board posts. The key requirement for the acceptance of smileys is that the form of communication is written and informal.

With the increasing use of the internet and wireless digital telecommunications, the adoption of the smileys has taken prominence. This movement was initiated by the youth and there is probably not a young person out there who does not know the meaning or usage of smileys.

The expressions have evolved quiet a bit since the early development of these symbols. At first they only expressed happiness or sadness, but now they can express nuanced emotions like disbelief, anger, playfulness and surprise.

The use of these expressions seems to disproportionately favored by females rather than males. The cause for this may be that females feel more comfortably expressing emotions, or perhaps they are more familiar with nuanced telecommunication techniques,

Obvious benefits of using emoticons is shorter messages to convey intimate text messages although some criticize their use as being detrimental to having depth in human communications.

Smileys have all been figured out and do not have the range of emotions that emoticons can express. The future of these symbols seem to have hit a plateau and the future or more nuanced symbols would require a wider range of symbols for longer text messages.

About the Author:
If you want your own free emoticons, or want to share your thoughts on emoticons and emoticons , just go to SmileySmileySmiley.com. You will be glad you did.



Tags:



Comments

Comments are closed.