A team from Google has proposed a new set of emoji to represent occupations. But for a change they depict women as well as men — an idea that the team thinks will better reflect, you know, real life.
The suggested emoji — there are 13 of them in total — depict occupations in sectors from construction and farming to science and education. Actually, they’re not standalone emoji, reports Buzzfeed: Instead, they’re constructed by combing existing icons, allowing them to create men or women working in a given profession. So woman + microscope = female scientist, while man + fried egg = male chef. Like this:
The team has formally submitted the emoji to the Unicode Consortium, explaining in the proposal that they represent “a wide range of professions for women and men with a goal of highlighting the diversity of women’s careers and empowering girls everywhere”. In fact, the team cites a New York Times op-ed about the lack of female emoji as a source of inspiration. You can read the proposal document here.
Despite being rather silly, emoji proposals follow a fairly formal approval procedure. But this set will probably be waved through with relative ease, because one of the team members — Mark Davis — is actually the president of the Unicode Consortium. Convenient.
Image: Unicode Consortium