Apple's New Emoji Characters Include An Hijabi And A Bearded Man

According to the Apple news room, "In celebration of World Emoji Day, Apple is sharing some of the new emoji coming to iOS, macOS and watchOS later this year."

Apple states that "The new emoji make it easier for users to express themselves with greater diversity." An hijabi is one of the new emoji characters to be available across Apple devices later this year. A bearded man is also one of the new emoji characters to be released and although growing a beard is now in vogue, an interesting observation is the fact that in Islam, men are encouraged to grow a beard as a means of religious identification somewhat similar to a woman in hijab. The hadith of Ibn ‘Umar states that the Messenger of ALLAH (Peace and blessings of ALLAH be upon him) said: “Be different from the mushrikeen: let your beards grow and trim your moustaches.”

The release of the hijabi emoji is the culmination of a proposal sent by a Muslim teenager - Rayouf Alhumedhi to Unicode, last year, Rayouf who lives in Germany noticed that there wasn't an emoji that represented her hijab clad self and others like her, so she decided to make a change.

She said she discovered how to submit a proposal for a new emoji from a Mashable story in her Snapchat feed, Rayouf then sent a proposal for a hijab emoji to Unicode Consortium, the organization that both reviews and develops new emoji characters, she also included an emoji of a man wearing a keffiyeh in her proposal as pictured below:

“In the age of digitalization, pictures prove to be a crucial element in communication,” Rayouf wrote in her proposal. “Emojis are more impactful and utilized than ever before. Millions use them to convey feelings, appearances and stories.”

Discussing her proposal in a Reddit AMA last year, Rayouf addressed questions about the symbolism of the hijab, particularly the contention that it represents a form of female oppression.

"Might seem baffling, but when I wear the headscarf I actually feel liberated because I'm in control of what I want to cover," she said. "The headscarf allows for people to see past a women's beauty and see her for her knowledge. Now I know, that some women are forced to wear it, but that is micro in comparison to those who see the beauty in it." 

The AMA, was part of an effort by the co-founder of reddit - Alexis Ohanian  to generate support for Rayouf's idea. Alexis Ohanian sponsored the proposal after learning about it. When Ohanian asked Rayouf during the AMA why the emoji was personally important to her, she replied: "Well, for one, I would like to be represented and acknowledged. Because with the massive [number] of women that wear the headscarf today, there should be at least one place on our keyboards reserved for them." 

Rayouf noted in her proposal that although the hijab is common attire for many Muslim women, it is not just exclusive to Islam. Women in both Orthodox Jewish and Eastern Orthodox Christian communities also wear headscarves, so those women could benefit from the emoji as well, she wrote.

Rayouf Alhumedhi

Hijabemoji.org - On the website created to raise awareness for the hijab emoji  campaign, the back story is narrated as follows:

"When Rayouf Alhumedhi, 15, was creating a new WhatsApp group chat with her friends last year, the group wanted make the title of the group a series of emojis: one to represent each girl. But Rayouf had a problem, none of the emojis really looked like her, because she’s Muslim, and wears a hijab.

Given the millions of women in the world who wear a headscarf every day, this seemed like a gross oversight.

So she set on a mission to fix that. First she fired off an email to Apple, but never heard back.

A few months later, in August 2016, she saw Mashable's Snapchat story on how to submit an emoji proposal to Unicode. She then spent two days typing up the proposal, using the dumpling emoji and female runner emoji proposals as models.

After she sent it in, she heard back from Jennifer 8. Lee, a member of the Unicode Emoji Subcommittee who had been thinking about the need for a hijab emoji. Rayouf's initial submission was a well-formed proposal, Jenny thought, as anybody who mentions Fitzpatrick modifiers knows what they are talking about.

Together, they began further changes and improvements to make the proposal more robust.

However, all emoji proposals need example glyphs. So Jenny asked Aphee Messer, a designer from Lincoln, Nebraska to work on the hijab emoji designs. After several revisions, they found ones that worked.

Jenny mentioned it to her friend, Alexis Ohanian, a co-founder of Reddit, who then arranged for a Reddit AMA on TwoXChromonies submitted for Rayouf. Alexis himself also signed on as a co-author."

Thanks to Rayouf Alhumedhi and all the people who helped her, the hijab emoji  and the bearded man emoji should be available on Apple operating systems later this year.