A Framework for Interpreting Emojis in Legal Contexts

Anne Merritt, University of OttawaFollow

Keywords

emojis, emoji, legal interpretation of emojis, meaning of emoji, evidence, South West Terminal v Achter Land and Cattle, emojis in court, emoji interpretation in courts, text message interpretation, emoji analysis in court, emoji analysis, unicode, emoji interpretation framework

Abstract

In the 2023 case of South West Terminal Ltd. v. Achter Land & Cattle Ltd., a Saskatchewan court found that a thumbs-up emoji, as a standalone item of communication, constituted the acceptance of a contract between a buyer and seller. The trial judge noted that such communication was “the new reality in Canadian society” for which courts should be prepared to interpret novel units of language arising in the digital age. However, an analysis of recent Canadian cases involving emojis shows that courts have not been prepared, with inconsistencies in how emojis are represented in evidence, how they are analysed, how much interpretive weight they are given, or whether they are dismissed as decorative and without linguistic value. This paper argues that while emojis are not a standardized form of communication, they hold linguistic value which makes them critical to the interpretation of evidence. Part I reviews how the field of linguistics has studied emojis. Part II explains how a corpus of English-language Canadian case law was built and analysed to map patterns and inconsistencies in Canadian courts’ emoji interpretation. It also argues that the South West analysis of the emoji in question provides a skeleton for an interpretive framework for emoji. Part III outlines how such a framework could be realized, drawing from both linguistics and jurisprudence. The paper concludes with a caution against courts’ downplaying the communicative value and function of emojis and argues that a structured interpretive approach could help courts more accurately infer meaning from typed communication in evidence.