They are how you flirt with the hottie from last night without seeming too desperate. They are insurance against texting your father “in that tone.” They keep the conversation light and the reader engaged. They are emoticons, and they are the symbols that save us all when our words are just not enough.

In a world where face-to-face conversations have long been on the decline in favor of text messaging, email and social networking, we are filling our emotional void through these simple but very powerful little faces.

An emoticon, or emotional icon, is a configuration of letters, punctuation marks or other keyboard symbols that act to represent a human facial expression. And whether you’re using Korean, Japanese or American-style emoticons, chances are you will at least get the gist of the emotional message.

That’s because symbols like common emoticons play off of universal archetypes — common experiences we all share. I hope that, no matter how bad midterms get — you don’t forget before mid-March what a smile looks like. You’re pretty confident that your friends, your family, anyone you text will remember, too. Because you are familiar with smiling, you recognize a colon and a left-parenthesis as a face to represent a grin.

Critics call emoticons a devolution of language. The written word may suffer, but communication — getting a message across with accurate understanding — is enhanced through emoticons. Their power comes from the fact that they serve a purpose that words alone cannot.

We all more or less grew up with text messaging. Some of us may even remember AOL Instant Messenger. For all that written word has given us, a collection of letters cannot accurately convey emotion or even intent the way a facial expression can. For all our intelligence, the human brain still sees a symbol as a more powerful means of communication than words on a page. For instance, :) is much more effective than the word “happy,” even though most people who read the word “happy” understand the positive association of feelings. But just how happy? Instead of writing excited or ecstatic, digital media communication favors :D.

Professional they are not, but emoticons do prove effective socially. No respectable job candidate has a winky face on her resume, even if her dream job involves communication design. But if you want to express a light-hearted message, you may consider including a :) instead of a simple message reading “I need to talk to you,” as such a phrase is wide open to misinterpretation.

But not all emoticons may be as clear as a sideways smiley face. If the message you are sending is mute — that is, you’re saying through text message you’re speechless or otherwise tongue-tied, only the most tech-savvy or those deeply invested in computer culture may understand a :-&.

Even with the ease and general acceptance of emoticons, they still may not be quite so simple to understand. Computers are supposed to make our lives easier, but technology quickly gets complicated. Sarcasm is something that can trip up effective emoticon interpretation. The :) may be a taunt instead of a representation of happiness. Emoticons are supposed to bridge the gap between sterile messages and face-to-face conversation, but a cynical or teasing texter may be just as bad as someone who forgoes emoticons entirely, at least when it comes to guaranteeing that the message will be understood.

Another unintentional disconnect to emoticons may be a gender difference. Women use emoticons more than men, according to a recent Rice University study. Perhaps more revealing in the study is that the researchers conducted the study at all. In fact, they even used an emoticon in the study’s title. But this was just one study and may not speak for this generation of humanity as a whole.

If effective communication is judged by how quickly and accurately a message is understood, emoticons have earned at least a participation award, if not a medal for innovation. The use of symbols is present even before we have records of written alphabets, but we have now come full-circle — we started using symbols for letters, now we are using letters as symbols. They are a part of culture that marks this era as one where humans adapt to overcome the obstacle of technology by adding emotion to an otherwise monotone message.

Use them or not, emoticons may just be the communication innovation of the age. Let’s just hope they don’t infiltrate spoken language, lol. ;-P

Renée is a senior in Media. She can be reached at [email protected].