Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 3
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Die Frau, die ungewollt mit Emojis ein Haus mietete

(The woman who inadvertently rented a house with emojis)

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Newspaper | Welt
Date | 24.5.2017
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | emojis, language threat, law, misunderstanding
Summary | The debate around whether emojis count as words or seriously meaningful content is very heated - not only in academics but also in law. The Oxford English dictionary only reheated that fire by choosing an emoji as word of the year. Multiple law cases have centered on misunderstandings around emoji use, most recently a case where a woman indicated interest in renting a house with emojis (flamenco dancer, dancer girls, squirrel, comet, a victory sign, and a bottle of Champagne). The house owner sued her for using misleading emojis after she decided not to rent the house after all.
Image Description | An image of a woman's hand holding a smartphone and picking out an emoji and a portrait of the Israely judge who worked on the emoji case.
Image Tags | emojis, female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone

No imprta q este scrito asi

(It doesnt matter how its written)

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Newspaper | El País
Date | 19.3.2014
Language | Spanish
Country | Spain
Topic Tags | abbreviations, language threat, spelling, texting, youth
Summary | A study in France demonstrated that text message characteristics have no impact on spelling skills. If you child texts using a lot of emoticons to replace words, or mispells certain words, it doesn't mean he or she is going to make more spelling mistakes in a writing assignment. He or she might even master spelling rules better than someone who doesn't text. Young people play with language and know when it is appropriate or not to use text message characteristics. However, some people disagree and think that texting can have a negative impact on spelling skills, the Spanish language, and calligraphy.
Image Description | Photograph of a group of young girls sitting and using their smartphones, and photograph of someone (hands) texting.
Image Tags | emojis, female(s), hand(s), smartphone, text

:) them or :( them, emojis make our messages feel more like us

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 14.6.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | emojis, language threat
Summary | Some people are happy about the new 'emojify' feature that Apple offers, and some people don't like it and think that future generations won't be able to understand the English language. Famous cognitivist Stephen Pinker argues in favor of such communicative features; people adapt their language to the medium they use. If people text or tweet, it doesn't mean they won't be able to communicate in other ways; the same holds true for emojis. Emojis are useful to convey information that is hard to transmit via text (e.g. tone of voice, facial expressions). Having representative emojis (e.g. different skin colors) is also important since they help construct users' identity. Some people are not totally happy with the set of emojis offered now; they still convey certain ideologies and norms (e.g. about gender).
Image Description | Photograph of a woman in a room full of emojis; she has a big 'smiling face with sunglasses emoji' on her head.
Image Tags | emojis, female(s)

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