👏 Clapping Hands

👏 Clapping Hands means applause. It has a second, purely typographic use: placed between the words of a sentence it turns them into a slow, emphatic hand-clap, a rhetorical device that started on Black Twitter and spread everywhere.

Sincere applause after good news; between words, deliberate emphasis. Note that a lone 👏 can also read as sarcastic slow-clapping.

• Well deserved 👏
• Read 👏 the 👏 brief 👏

Applause reads as approval almost everywhere – with exceptions. In parts of Nigeria and Pakistan slow clapping can be pointedly sarcastic, and English has its own tradition of the derisive slow clap.

Online a distinct form has emerged: clapping hands placed between individual words – “that 👏 is 👏 the 👏 point” – to hammer a statement home. That usage comes out of AAVE and queer online spaces, and quickly reads as borrowed when used outside them.

• 👏👏 – Recognition – placed between words it also adds emphasis.
• 👏👏 – Recognition – placed between words it also adds emphasis.
• 👏👐 – Clapping Hands and Open Hands
• 👏🤝 – Clapping Hands with Handshake
• 👏🙏 – Clapping Hands plus Folded Hands
• 👏🤲 – Clapping Hands and Palms up Together

Easy to mix up with 👐 Open Hands, 🤝 Handshake or 🙏 Folded Hands. They look alike but do not mean the same thing – when in doubt, check the name.