The Loudly Crying Face Emoji (đ); what does it mean to you? I have always thought about it as an Emoji that communicates sadness, stress, and other more melancholy emotions, but to some it is interpreted as a laughing so intensely that you start to cry (similar to the Face with Tears of Joy Emoji đ). The readings from this past week encouraged me to think deeply about the connotative vs. denotative meanings of Emojis and how widely varied the denotative meanings can be in different groups, age ranges, and communities. I think it is interesting to think about the design process of these Emojis and I wonder if when designers were creating them, if they were focusing on just the connotative meanings of the icons or whether they tried to predict the denotative meanings and how the icons would be used. Also, the icons vary depending on the device/platform they are being used (ex. Apple vs. Samsung vs. Facebook), and these slight variations can change the denotative meaning.
Here is a link that explores how the different crying Emojis are used. (I actually saw a post about this the other day on social media that initially encouraged me to start thinking about connotative vs. denotative meanings of Emojis!)
DSGN 264-401 | Fall 2020 