{"id":450,"date":"2025-03-11T21:18:52","date_gmt":"2025-03-11T21:18:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/?p=450"},"modified":"2025-05-25T20:32:24","modified_gmt":"2025-05-25T20:32:24","slug":"comparing-and-contrasting-hieroglyphics-to-tiktok","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/comparing-and-contrasting-hieroglyphics-to-tiktok\/","title":{"rendered":"Comparing and Contrasting Hieroglyphics to Tiktok"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Comparing and contrasting icons used throughout human history extends beyond the idea of icon. We have always communicated visually through art and drawings. Icons are the modern version of\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Both TikTok icons and hieroglyphs use pictures to communicate. TikTok\u2019s icons show actions in their app, while hieroglyphs told stories and showed beliefs.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can compare Tiktok\u2019s icons to Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-452\" src=\"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.16\u202fPM-300x101.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"101\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.16\u202fPM-300x101.png 300w, https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.16\u202fPM-768x258.png 768w, https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.16\u202fPM.png 954w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Considering music, Egyptian hieroglyphics tended to stick to instruments to depict music being played. While Tiktok started out as a music app and expanded to social media, it kept its logo as a musical note. Contrasting from the hieroglyphics as one is depicting an instrument and the other depicts a musical note played by an instrument, simplifying the meaning of music as universally music notes now depict that sound\/music is being played.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">One other interesting aspect of Tiktok is its integration of its own emojis. Users seem to enjoy using the Tiktok emojis, which are also expressive icons sometimes more than the default iPhone ones.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">This shows that people enjoy new and different ways of expressing themselves.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-451\" src=\"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.23\u202fPM-300x216.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"216\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.23\u202fPM-300x216.png 300w, https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.23\u202fPM-768x554.png 768w, https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-2.17.23\u202fPM.png 804w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Humans naturally understand visually which is why signs and drawings can connect people regardless of what language they speak. This universal idea is why emojis and icons work.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sources<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Gadalla, Moustafa. Egyptian Harmony: The Visual Music. Tehuti Research Foundation, 2000.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Emojipedia. &#8220;TikTok Emoji List &amp; Emoji Meanings.&#8221; Emojipedia, 2024,<\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/emojipedia.org\/tiktok\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/emojipedia.org\/tiktok\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">https:\/\/emojipedia.org\/tiktok<\/span><\/i><\/a><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Baker, A. J. &#8220;Emojis Are Hieroglyphs, Says Curator of Israel Museum Exhibit.&#8221; The New York\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Times, 22 Jan. 2020,<\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/01\/22\/arts\/design\/emojis-hieroglyphs-israel-museum.html\"> <i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/01\/22\/arts\/design\/emojis-hieroglyphs-israel-museum.html<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Alshenqeeti, Hamza. &#8220;Are Emojis Creating a New or Old Visual Language for New\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Generations? A Socio-Semiotic Study.&#8221; Advances in Language and Literary Studies, vol. 7, no. 6, Dec. 2016, pp. 56-69,<\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/eric.ed.gov\/?id=EJ1126897\"> <i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">https:\/\/eric.ed.gov\/?id=EJ1126897<\/span><\/i><\/a><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Comparing and contrasting icons used throughout human history extends beyond the idea of icon. We have always communicated visually [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-early-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":453,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450\/revisions\/453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interactiondesignhistory.com\/Spring2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}