None of the nearly 4,000 emojis feature afro hairstyles, grossly misrepresenting a large part of our world. Rise.365, a British community support group is trying to change that.
A group of young members of Rise.365 drew emojis that reflected their own appearance. In the end, they landed on four hairstyles that reflect the community: braids, afro, locs, and cornrows.
The Unicode Consortium is the organisation that sets the standards for emojis and will decide whether these suggestions will become reality. An earlier attempt to get afro hair admitted failed. But the Rise.365 crew is undeterred. They are asking people to search for “afro hair” on Google to show the consortium that this is an important term.
See: The push for emojis in Black women’s styles: ‘We need to normalise that our hair is acceptable’ at The Guardian.
Images of emojis by Rise.365.