Abstract

This study examines how emojis function as pragmatic substitutes for linguistic expression within culturally and linguistically distinct digital environments. Focusing on two structurally similar yet discursively divergent social media platforms—Sina Weibo (China) and X (formerly Twitter, Spain)—the research explores how platform-mediated communication norms and cultural conventions shape the expressive roles of emojis during the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on a qualitative corpus of high-frequency emojis identified from 2020 user reports and digital discourse samples, the study analyzes how symbols such as ❤️, 🙏, 💪, and 😷 evolved from paralinguistic cues into markers of emotional alignment, communal stance, and social commentary. While emojis inherently carry visual simplicity and cross-cultural recognizability, their pragmatic functions are dynamically reconstructed through contextualized use within platform-specific discourse environments and cultural-linguistic frameworks. On Sina Weibo, emotionally supportive emojis were predominantly aligned with collectivist sentiments and contributed to the shaping of a positive, harmonious discursive atmosphere, reflecting broader cultural expectations of affective solidarity. In contrast, on X, emojis were often mobilized within ironic, critical, and reality-oriented narratives, enabled by a more decentralized and open discursive space, highlighting localized identity negotiation practices. The findings demonstrate that emojis, as semiotic resources for identity performance and affective expression, acquire context-dependent meanings through their iterative use in socially salient digital interactions. This study proposes a cross-cultural typology of emoji functions, contributing to media linguistics and intercultural communication studies by illuminating how visual symbols facilitate or constrain expressive nuances in multilingual and culturally diverse digital publics.