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up vote 4 down vote favorite

My friend ended a letter thusly:

あとでノシ

ノシ symbolizes a waving arm. Is this considered 絵文字 or does it have a different name?

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This question is trivial. And it is not helpful. As Chocolate comments, if you want to call it, you can. If you don't want to, you can not to. – sawa May 24 '12 at 9:37
I learned that it is called both things so it was helpful to me. I apologize if you were offended or in any way put in a bad mood by the triviality of this question. – yadokari May 25 '12 at 1:34
I was not offended at all. I just felt that it could be either way or the other, and does not matter. Never mind. – sawa May 25 '12 at 3:08

1 Answer

up vote 7 down vote accepted

Nico Nico actually calls it 顔文字. (And so do other places like here.)

Edit: There is, perhaps, some crossover, but 絵文字 more broadly refers to things like pictograms (pictures with meaning), while 顔文字 refers to...well, 顔文字 (characters put together to make faces).

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but it's not a face :/ ~thanks – yadokari May 22 '12 at 1:20
Chiebukuro actually suggests that the face part of （＾－＾）ﾉｼ just gets omitted. – SomethingJapanese May 22 '12 at 1:27
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Some call it 顔文字 and others call it 絵文字　imiimiimi.seesaa.net/article/184478993.html　oshiete.goo.ne.jp/qa/1507390.html – Chocolate May 22 '12 at 3:43

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