Smileys are one of the internet’s most widespread forms of communication.
Social media websites have dozens of pictures to add to messages, and everyone knows the meaning of the most common text smileys, such as 🙁 or :).
Some smileys, however, can be confusing.
Let’s take a look at :v
What does :v mean?
As a general rule, people use :v (or :V) to show sarcasm or humor. Alternatively, some people consider :v to represent shouting or general approval of a statement. Study the context to understand the exact meaning of the smiley.
The origin of :v
The origin of :v is hard to track down. Some sources suggest it originates from an old Facebook smiley that looked like Pac-Man, a yellow circle with a V-shaped mouth.
If you look sideways at the :v smiley, you can see that the v letter represents exactly this kind of open mouth, while the two dots are the eyes.
Although it’s interesting to think of this as a Pac-Man smiley, that doesn’t really clarify its meaning.
All Pac-Man does is eat small round dots, food and ghosts, but this smiley has nothing to do with eating at all.
Another way to think about this smiley is to compare it to a different pictorial smiley face, the “awesome face” or “epic smiley.”
This face, which originated from a 2003 Pokémon web forum according to an investigation by game designer Chris Ainsworth, grew immensely popular on several large, early web communities including Something Awful and 4chan.
What does it mean? The name “awesome face” gives a big clue. Basically, people used this visual smiley to show that they thought something was awesome.
Over time (and because people on early internet forums tended to be sarcastic a lot) the meaning took on a sarcastic overtone, although it can still be used sincerely.
Ainsworth quotes its original creator as suggesting it represents “childish glee,” which is a nice way of putting it.
Although the awesome face smiley isn’t exactly the same as :v, understanding the meaning of that visually similar picture-based smiley helps us get a handle on what to do when you see someone stick :v on the end of a sentence directed at you.
How :v is used today
Communication on the internet often varies from person to person or community to community and also tends to change at a rapid rate.
Generally speaking, however, there are three main schools of thought as to what :v means.
First, :v can be used to show humor or sarcasm. Second, it can be used to represent shouting.
Finally, :v can be used to simply show approval of a statement.
Because there is no explicit definition or style guide for :v, you often have to use the context of the messages it accompanies to figure out what the person is using it for.
This might seem counterintuitive, but it’s not really that different from a lot of language use.
The way people speak or simply how they hold themselves in real life often presents just as much meaning as what they’re saying.
Because those nonverbal cues are absent from text-only communication, people turn to smiley faces instead.
:v for humor
The meaning of :v that’s most directly tied to the awesome face is its use to portray a jokey tone.
In this case, you can think of :v as the smiley face equivalent of pausing after every joke you make and looking expectantly at your audience until they laugh.
Basically, :v in this mode represents being obvious about the fact that you’re making a joke you think is funny.
Think of the classic Muppet Fozzie Bear, who often makes a similar looking face when he tells terrible jokes to his captive audience.
Also like the awesome face emoji, :v in this case can be used sarcastically or to make fun of people who think they’re being clever when you want to argue they’re actually not.
In the latter case, you might see someone include a direct quote from another individual and then the :v smiley after.
As with most humor, you’ll need to use context and your understanding of the individual using the smiley to figure out their level of sincerity.
Example Sentences
“How does he smell?”
“Terrible! :V”
Here, the sharer of this timeless dad joke has added a :V to the end of the punchline. They probably don’t think it’s all that funny, either, and the smiley is a nod to this.
This sarcastic comment might come from an unhappy gift recipient. In this case, the :v represents sarcasm rather than an actual humorous statement.
:v for shouting
An alternative meaning for :v is that it represents shouting.
In this interpretation, the relatively wide angle of the v or V compared to the simple curve of a 🙂 makes the “mouth” of the smiley look like it’s open wide.
Shouting can be good or bad, of course, but people are more likely to use the :v when they want to amplify their message or express loud volume without using caps lock, which is the more common way to represent shouting online and which many people find extremely annoying.
Example Sentences
In the examples above, :v is unlikely to represent humor. The idea that wealthy individuals should be fairly taxed is not particularly funny and neither is telling people to vote.
Instead, these are strong opinions that someone might want to spread far and wide. It’s best to assume the :v is the equivalent of shouting them out.
The third example, internet shorthand for “oh my god,” is vague enough that the intent could be just about anything. But it’s still possible that :v stands for shouting.
:v for approval
The final mainstream meaning for :v is simply to show approval.
Like the humorous/sarcastic meaning, this version also owes a spiritual debt to the awesome face. If you approve of something, then you probably think it’s awesome.
Example Sentences
“:v”
In both examples, the :v doesn’t make sense for shouting and neither exchange appears to be sarcastic or funny.
It’s most likely that the person using :v is just excited and wants to show it with a simple smiley instead of being wordy.
How to use :v in a sentence
As the examples above show, the most common way to use :v in a sentence is to place it immediately after the sentence ends.
Unlike with some other smileys, you can’t really stick :v halfway through a sentence or replace any words with it.
This smiley also doesn’t make much sense by itself most of the time. It really does need the context of at least a word or two to make any sense.
That said, you can use :v by itself as a reply to someone else’s message.
Because its meaning is so variable, though, you run the risk of being misunderstood as angry or sarcastic even if you’re just trying to convey a sentiment like “That’s awesome!”
To recap, smileys are a great way to add meaning to communications online. To be on the safe side, though, it’s best to say what you mean as clearly as possible first.
Hey fellow Linguaholics! It’s me, Marcel. I am the proud owner of linguaholic.com. Languages have always been my passion and I have studied Linguistics, Computational Linguistics and Sinology at the University of Zurich. It is my utmost pleasure to share with all of you guys what I know about languages and linguistics in general.