Finger heart

The mini heart gesture is a trend that was popularized in South Korea in which the index finger and thumb come together like a snap to form a tiny heart.[1]

For the heart shape formed with two hands, see Hand heart.
Finger heart

While the exact origin of the finger heart is not known, one theory suggests that the finger heart gesture was first used in a Korean TV drama called "Princess Hours," which aired in 2006. In the drama, the female lead character would use the gesture to express her love for the male lead character.

Another theory suggests that the gesture was popularized by K-pop idols, who would often use the gesture to express their love and gratitude to their fans.

Regardless of its exact origins, the finger heart gesture has become a popular symbol of affection and support, particularly in Korean pop culture, and has since spread to other parts of the world.

Importance

The finger heart gesture has become an important symbol of affection and support, particularly in Korean pop culture and among fans of K-pop. It is often used by idols to express their love and gratitude to their fans, and by fans to show their support for their favorite idols and each other.

The finger heart has also become a way for people to connect with each other across cultures and languages. The gesture has gained popularity outside of Korea and is now recognized and used by people all over the world. This has helped to create a sense of community among fans of K-pop and has helped to break down cultural barriers.

In addition, the finger heart gesture is a simple and easy way to express positive emotions and connect with others. It can be used to show love, support, and appreciation, and is a powerful symbol of unity and solidarity.

The finger heart gesture has become so popular in Korea that some stores and restaurants have started using it as part of their logos and branding.

The finger heart gesture has been used by several world leaders, including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, United States President Joseph R. Biden Jr., and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.


K-pop idol performing the finger heart gesture in 2015

Before the appearance of finger hearts, it was common to make small hearts with two hands or to make large hearts by raising and curving both arms above the head. Conventionally, heart gestures using both hands and arms have been performed worldwide, but finger hearts are also called Korean Finger Hearts because of its association with the rise of South Korean pop culture.

In South Korea, it is a known symbol among Korean celebrities (namely actors and singers) and their fans, and is popularly performed using the thumb and index finger.[2]

Though various instances of finger hearts may be found from before 2010 (namely, in K-pop musician G-Dragon's childhood photo,[3] finger hearts are considered to have been first popularized by actress Kim Hye-soo[2][4][5][6] then in the K-pop community by Infinite's Nam Woohyun in 2011.[7][8][9]

Joe Biden and BTS performing the gesture in 2022

The thumb and index finger gesture has become popular across Asia due to the popularity of K-pop and Korean dramas, and increasingly so in other parts of the world as a factor of the Korean Wave. Most notably the king of K-pop G-Dragon and other bands like PSY, EXO , BTS have popularized the gesture to a wider international audience.

During the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, The North Face provided gloves with highlighted thumb and index finger sleeves to highlight this symbol.[10]

In 2021, the finger heart was added to Unicode 14.0 and Emoji 14.0 with the codepoint U+1FAF0 ๐Ÿซฐ as "Hand with Index Finger and Thumb Crossed".[11]

In 2022, the finger heart went viral on Western social media, when actor Tom Cruise and the cast of Top Gun: Maverick, did the finger heart and other heart hand signs on their South Korean promotion of the film.


See also

References
  1. Boboltz, Sara (9 February 2018). "Everything You Need To Know About South Korea's Finger Heart Trend". HuffPost. Retrieved 17 October 2020.
  2. "US Olympians Try Their Hands at K-Pop's 'Finger Heart.' What's That?". NBC Chicago. 9 February 2018. Retrieved 25 February 2018.
  3. "Q Dragon Image". hellokpop.com. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  4. White, Adam (16 August 2019). "Finger Hearts: A Brief History of the Korean Trend". Discovery. Cathay Pacific. Retrieved 3 August 2022.
  5. "[์งค์ค] '์†๊ฐ€๋ฝ ํ•˜ํŠธ'์˜ ์ฐฝ์‹œ์ž๊ฐ€ ๊น€ํ˜œ์ˆ˜?". Dispatch (in Korean). 10 June 2017. Retrieved 3 August 2022.
  6. "์†๊ฐ€๋ฝ ํ•˜ํŠธ, ์›์กฐ๋Š” ๋ˆ„๊ตด๊นŒ?". Wikitree (in Korean). 22 March 2016. Retrieved 3 August 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  7. "๋‚จ์šฐํ˜„ "์†๊ฐ€๋ฝํ•˜ํŠธ, ์ €์ž‘๊ถŒ ๊ฐ€๋Šฅํ•˜๋‚˜"โ€ฆ์ตœํ™”์ • "'๋ง›์žˆ์œผ๋ฉด 0์นผ๋กœ๋ฆฌ'๋„"". ๋‰ด์Šค1 (in Korean). 26 October 2021. Retrieved 9 May 2022.
  8. "๋‚จ์šฐํ˜„ "'์†๊ฐ€๋ฝ ํ•˜ํŠธ', ๋‚ด๊ฐ€ ์œ ํ–‰์‹œ์ผœ"". ์Šคํƒ€ํˆฌ๋ฐ์ด (in Korean). 4 June 2016. Retrieved 9 May 2022.
  9. "'ํ•ดํ”ผํˆฌ๊ฒŒ๋”' ๋‚จ์šฐํ˜„ "์†๊ฐ€๋ฝ ํ•˜ํŠธ, ๋‚ด๊ฐ€ ์›์กฐ" [์‹œ์„ ๊ฐ•ํƒˆ]". tvdaily.co.kr. 5 October 2018. Retrieved 9 May 2022.
  10. "Five trendy 2018 Winter Olympics K-fashion items to keep you feeling warm and looking cool". South China Morning Post. 6 February 2018.
  11. "๐Ÿซฐ Hand with Index Finger and Thumb Crossed Emoji". Emojipedia. Retrieved 23 April 2023.


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