The mini heart gesture is a trend that was popularized in South Korea in which the index finger and thumb come together like a snap to form a tiny heart. [1] The gesture was popularized by K-pop idols, who would often use the gesture to express their love and gratitude to their fans. It is represented in Unicode with the codepoint U+1FAF0🫰 as "Hand with Index Finger and Thumb Crossed".
Before the appearance of finger hearts, it was common to make small hearts with two hands or to make large hearts by raising and curving both arms above the head. Conventionally, heart gestures using both hands and arms have been performed worldwide, but finger hearts are also called Korean Finger Hearts because of its association with the rise of South Korean pop culture.
In South Korea, it is a known symbol among Korean celebrities (namely actors and singers) and their fans, and is popularly performed using the thumb and index finger. [2]
Though various instances of finger hearts may be found from before 2010 (namely, in K-pop musician G-Dragon's childhood photo [3] ), finger hearts are considered to have been first popularized by actress Kim Hye-soo [2] [4] [5] then in the K-pop community by Infinite's Nam Woohyun in 2011. [6] [7] [8]
The thumb and index finger gesture has become popular across Asia due to the popularity of K-pop and Korean dramas, and increasingly so in other parts of the world as a factor of the Korean Wave. In K-pop most notably, singers like G-Dragon and PSY plus bands like EXO and BTS have popularized the gesture to a wider international audience.
During the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, The North Face provided gloves with highlighted thumb and index finger sleeves to highlight this symbol. [9]
In 2021 the finger heart was added to Unicode 14.0 and Emoji 14.0 with the codepoint U+1FAF0🫰 as "Hand with Index Finger and Thumb Crossed". [10]
In Japan, the gesture is also broadly used on Instagram, for example.
A mudra is a symbolic or ritual gesture or pose in Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism. While some mudras involve the entire body, most are performed with the hands and fingers.
Wingdings is a series of dingbat fonts that render letters as a variety of symbols. They were originally developed in 1990 by Microsoft by combining glyphs from Lucida Icons, Arrows, and Stars licensed from Charles Bigelow and Kris Holmes. Certain versions of the font's copyright string include attribution to Type Solutions, Inc., the maker of a tool used to hint the font.
The Vulcan salute is a hand gesture popularized by the 1960s television series Star Trek. It consists of a raised hand with the palm forward and the thumb extended, while the fingers are parted between the middle and ring finger. The gesture was devised by Star Trek actor Leonard Nimoy as a salute for the alien Vulcan species, and is popular within the Science fiction fandom and nerd culture. The blessing phrase "live long and prosper" is frequently spoken alongside it.
A teacup is a cup for drinking tea. It generally has a small handle that may be grasped with the thumb and one or two fingers. It is typically made of a ceramic material and is often part of a set which is composed of a cup and a matching saucer or a trio that includes a small cake or sandwich plate. These may be part of a tea set combined with a teapot, cream jug, covered sugar bowl, and slop bowl. Teacups are often wider and shorter than coffee cups. Cups for morning tea are conventionally larger than cups for afternoon tea.
The shaka sign, sometimes known as "hang loose" is a gesture with friendly intent often associated with Hawaii and surf culture. It consists of extending the thumb and smallest finger while holding the three middle fingers curled, and gesturing in salutation while presenting the front or back of the hand; the wrist may be rotated back and forth for emphasis. The shaka sign is similar to the letter Y in the American manual alphabet in American Sign Language. The shaka sign should not be confused with the sign of the horns, where the index and pinky finger are extended and the thumb holds down the middle two fingers.
Chinese number gestures are a method to signify the natural numbers one through ten using one hand. This method may have been developed to bridge the many varieties of Chinese—for example, the numbers 4 and 10 are hard to distinguish in some dialects. Some suggest that it was also used by business people during bargaining when they wish for more privacy in a public place. These gestures are fully integrated into Chinese Sign Language.
The OK gesture or OK sign or ring gesture is performed by joining the thumb and index finger in a circle, and holding the other fingers straight or relaxed away from the palm. Commonly used by scuba divers, it signifies "I am OK" or "Are you OK?" when underwater. In most English-speaking countries it denotes approval, agreement, and that all is well or "okay". In other contexts or cultures, similar gestures may have different meanings including those that are negative, offensive, financial, numerical, devotional, political, or purely linguistic.
The sign of the horns is a hand gesture with a variety of meanings and uses in various cultures. It is formed by extending the index and little fingers while holding the middle and ring fingers down with the thumb.
A thumb signal, usually described as a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, is a common hand gesture achieved by a closed fist held with the thumb extended upward or downward, respectively. The thumbs-up gesture is associated with positivity, approval, achievement, satisfaction and solidarity, while the thumbs-down gesture is associated with concern, disapproval, dissatisfaction, rejection and failure.
Finger-counting, also known as dactylonomy, is the act of counting using one's fingers. There are multiple different systems used across time and between cultures, though many of these have seen a decline in use because of the spread of Arabic numerals.
The manicule, ☛, is a typographic mark with the appearance of a hand with its index finger extending in a pointing gesture. Originally used for handwritten marginal notes, it later came to be used in printed works to draw the reader's attention to important text. Though once widespread, it is rarely used today, except as an occasional archaic novelty.
A facepalm is the physical gesture of placing one's hand across one's face, lowering one's face into one's hand or hands or covering or closing one's eyes. The gesture is often exaggerated by giving the motion more force and making a slapping noise when the hand comes in contact with the face. The gesture is found in many cultures as a display of frustration, disappointment, exasperation, embarrassment, horror, shock, surprise, exhaustion, sarcasm, shame, or incredulous disbelief.
KPS 9566 is a North Korean standard specifying a character encoding for the Chosŏn'gŭl (Hangul) writing system used for the Korean language. The edition of 1997 specified an ISO 2022-compliant 94×94 two-byte coded character set. Subsequent editions have added additional encoded characters outside of the 94×94 plane, in a manner comparable to UHC or GBK.
The ILY is a sign from American Sign Language which, as a gesture, has moved into the mainstream. Seen primarily in the United States and other Americanized countries, the sign originated among deaf schoolchildren using American Sign Language to create a sign from a combination of the signs for the letters I, L, and Y.
An obscene gesture is a movement or position of the body, especially of the hands or arms, that is considered exceedingly offensive or vulgar in some particular cultures. Such gestures are often sexually suggestive.
The regional indicator symbols are a set of 26 alphabetic Unicode characters (A–Z) intended to be used to encode ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 two-letter country codes in a way that allows optional special treatment.
A hand heart is a gesture in which a person forms a heart shape using their fingers.
Face with Tears of Joy (😂) is an emoji that represents a crying with laughter facial expression. While it is broadly referred to as an emoji, since it is used to demonstrate emotion, it is also referred to as an emoticon. Since the emoji has evolved from numerous different designs pre-unicode, it has different names and meanings in different regions and cultures. It is also known as Tears of Joy emoji, lol emoji, joy emoji, laughing emoji, cry-laugh emoji, crying laughing emoji, or the laughing crying emoji. The emoji is used in communication to portray joking and teasing on messaging platforms including Apple's iMessage and Meta's WhatsApp, as well as social media websites such as Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, and Instagram. The emoji is one of the most commonly used emojis in the Emoticons Unicode block. The Oxford Dictionary recognised the emoji as its Word of the Year in 2015 due to its common usage.
Che vuoi?, alternatively described as ma che vuoi?, ma che dici?/ma che stai dicendo?, or simply che? ("what?"), is one of the best known hand gestures of Italy. In English, it is sometimes referred to as "pinched fingers" or "finger purse". It is meant to express disbelief at what the other person is saying or doing, and/or to ridicule their opinions.
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