emoticon
Abbreviation for emotion icon. In electronic communication, a multi-character symbol, created with ASCII characters, to express emotions and physical characteristics that would normally be communicated by body language and facial expressions in face-to-face communication.
Note: Emoticons are most often used in informal e-mail messages and newsgroup postings and are usually designed to be viewed sideways. Some examples of emoticons are:
Symbol
Meaning
Why?
🙂
happiness
a smiley face
🙁
unhappiness, disappointment
a frown
😉
slyness, “just kidding”
a wink
😮
surprise, shock
open mouth
:-\
irony
tilted mouth