6 Minute English / Do emojis make language better?

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript.

Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Sam.

And I'm Neil.

It's nice to see you, Neil, [smiley face], [high five], [fist bump]!

What's this, Sam? Are you saying hello with emojis?!

Yes, I am! In this programme, we're entering the world of emojis - the small characters people use to show emotions in texts and emails. Do you have a favourite emoji, Neil? Mine's the [crying tears of laughter] emoji.

I like the [smiling face with hearts] one, and with over three thousand emojis to choose from, there's one for every occasion. It's one of the reasons why emojis have become so popular over the last 20 years - they let people put back some of the human emotion that's missing in written texts and emails.

We'll be finding out more about emojis, and learning some related vocabulary, soon but first I have a question for you, Neil. It's about the word 'emoji' itself, which was invented in 1999 in Japan for the first internet-enabled mobile phones. The name, 'emoji', comes from the combination two Japanese words, but which words? Is the word 'emoji' a combination of:a) face and emotion?b) picture and character? orc) message and image?

I'll say it's a) face and emotion.

OK, Neil. We'll find out if your answer gets a [thumbs up] at the end of the programme. When we talk with someone face to face, we use physical gestures like smiling, laughing or nodding to show the other person how we feel. But these gestures get lost in written communication.