Beyond "Laughing Out Loud"

Yesterday, I became utterly delighted by the thought of future/alien linguists trying to interpret the meaning of the commonly-used phrase "lol." Surely, everything they could find on the matter would formally define it as "laughing out loud," a description that does not encapsulate the complexities of how it is used in our modern age.

In fact, the meaning has evolved so far past its formal (and original) definition of "laughing out loud" that it is almost indecipherable in modern context without total immersion into popular culture. Many of my totally normal, average-Joe, older relatives and friends don't even really grasp its current meaning. It conveys something that is only part word/phrase. It is something beyond word alone, it is something used to relay that which the written English language usually does not have the tools to convey: tone.

So this train of thought led me on an online journey to see how our use of "lol" would be defined by someone or something with only the internet and old journals to interpret English. I was not surprised to find that it is almost exclusively formally defined as "laughing out loud." So I turned to Urban Dictionary, a useful (albeit deeply flawed) tool for understanding modern language as it continues to evolve. I came across this definition:

See, I take several issues with the laws of "lol" laid out in this definition. For one thing, it paints an awfully negative picture of the world and of our society at large. For another, it only seems to scratch the surface of what "lol" really means- it's not just a "pointless acronym" to stick in your sentence because it's "engraved into your mind." Because it does convey meaning which means it cannot be pointless! Even in all of these contexts, something is being communicated that this definition just does not see the value in. This just doesn't dive deeply enough into what it really means in context.

Then there's this definition:

This is definitely better! But it is severely limited and does not even begin to address all the other ways it can be used.

So I took it on myself to explore all that "lol" can mean.

"lol" can mean:

• I'm being ironic
• What I'm about to say might sound sad/bad but it's totally okay to laugh/think it's funny
• I might sound pissed/sad/not okay but it's okay
• I just said something serious but I'm either being passive-aggressive or I'm trying to keep things light
• I'm pissed but not willing to confront you about what you just said
• I am about to react to something (i.e. "wtf" or "omg") and want to convey particular surprise
• I am using this as a sort of breather between two complimentary thoughts
• I am using this as a sort of breather in general. Like, if it were a real conversation, there'd be a quick recognition of what was just said without the conversation flowing back to someone else yet.
• I know this message is already really long but I'm not done saying my piece yet

And I'm sure I am barely scratching the surface of the potential meanings of this versatile phrase.

I guess what I'm saying is that it's easy to dismiss modern evolutions of language as trivial and low-class, but it'd be absolutely silly not to acknowledge the broad range of meaning that it can communicate- and the value of its existence! Isn't language, after all, an evolving, living, breathing art? What started as an acronym to communicate laughter online has developed into a word in and of itself- and a complex one, at that! It tells the reader how they are supposed to interpret your words. It communicates something, the way all words do.

I just hope that the future/alien linguists will be able to understand its meaning from context because understanding language outside of directly translated acronyms will help them understand so much about the other content they'll be studying.