Business Insider is covering the use of Emoji in communication. This is something that is sure to outrage Grammar Nazis and those who are proper language traditionalists. Rather than panic and wonder how the youth are going to make it, we should step back and think outside the box. We already have situations in business where proper English is not spoken. Go into any warehouse or assembly line staffed by immigrants and you will find less than perfect written and spoken English. Chinglish is also a term applied to products that have had poorly written translation software applied to make the translation from Mandarin to English. The translation may not be perfect, but we understand what the general meaning is.
A well known SciFi writer has created a world in the future where English and Mandarin are the official languages of the human race. What if that isn’t the case? What if a new abbreviated language such as the one teenagers use for texting is the unified language of the world? What if we become like the Ancient Egyptians and move to a hieroglyphic language to be all inclusive? This is where emoji may fit in. The old view of business is dying out as the Baby Boomers retire from the workforce. There are many VP’s today who don’t perform drug testing because it’s outdated and it takes away from the bottom line. There are also many people in GenX and GenY who will hire subject matter experts, no matter what their fluency in English is. If we can communicate in the made up language of Chinglish, why not communicate using other ways? The only thing holding us back is an outdated mentality of thinking something has to be done a certain way, rather than something has to be done.