Jejemon () is a

popular culture Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a ...

phenomenon in the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

. The ''

Philippine Daily Inquirer The ''Philippine Daily Inquirer'' (''PDI''), or simply the ''Inquirer'', is an English-language newspaper in the Philippines. Founded in 1985, it is often regarded as the Philippines' newspaper of record. The newspaper is the most awarded br ...

'' describes Jejemons as a "new breed of hipster who have developed not only their own language and written text but also their own subculture and fashion."

Origins

This style of shorthand typing arose through the

short messaging service Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

, in which each text message sent by a cellphone is limited to 160 characters, evident in popular phone models in the early 2000s such as the

Nokia 5110 The Nokia 5110 is a GSM mobile phone that was introduced by Nokia on 12 April 1998. The 5110, also known as Nokia 5146 on One2One (now T-Mobile), or the nk402 on Orange in the UK, was intended for the consumer market, succeeding Nokia 3110 and ...

. As a result, an "

SMS language Short Message Service (SMS) language, textism, or textese is the abbreviated language and slang commonly used in the late 1990s and early 2000s with mobile phone text messaging, and occasionally through Internet-based communication such as ema ...

" developed in which words were shortened in order to fit the 160-character limit. However, some jejemons are not really "conserving" characters; instead, they are lengthening their message. On April 14, 2010, on a Filipino

Tumblr Tumblr (stylized as tumblr; pronounced "tumbler") is an American microblogging and social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and currently owned by Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content to a sho ...

page, a post about vice presidential candidate

Jejomar Binay Jejomar "Jojo" Cabauatan Binay Sr. (born Jesus Jose Cabauatan Binay; November 11, 1942) is a Filipino lawyer and politician who served as the 13th vice president of the Philippines from 2010 to 2016, under President Benigno Aquino III. A h ...

indicated that Binay was the Jejemon's preferred vice presidential candidate, complete with a fake poster with him called "Makki Autors". Later the use of word ''jejemon'' to refer to such people made rounds in various Filipino internet message boards. The word ''Jejemon'' is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsPokémon and ''jeje'' as an expression of laughter. Such short-handed language is not limited to Filipinos: Thais use "5555" to denote "hahahaha," since the number 5 in Thai language is pronounced as "ha."

Demographics

The Jejemons are said to be the new ''yoyoyo~'', a term used for Filipinos of the lower income class. The parameters of being classified as a Jejemon are still unclear, and how the different "levels" of "Jejemonism" are reached, although there are named levels such as "mild," "moderate" and "severe" or "terminal."

Language

The

sociolect In sociolinguistics, a sociolect is a form of language ( non-standard dialect, restricted register) or a set of lexical items used by a socioeconomic class, profession, an age group, or other social group. Sociolects involve both passive acqui ...

of the Jejemons, called ''Jejenese'', is derived from English,

Filipino Filipino may refer to: * Something from or related to the Philippines ** Filipino language, standardized variety of 'Tagalog', the national language and one of the official languages of the Philippines. ** Filipinos, people who are citizens of th ...

and their code-switched variant,

Taglish Taglish or Englog is code-switching and/or code-mixing in the use of Tagalog and English, the most common languages of the Philippines. The words ''Taglish'' and ''Englog'' are portmanteaux of the words ''Tagalog'' and ''English''. The earliest ...

. It has its own, albeit unofficial, orthography, known as ''Jejebet'', which uses the Filipino variant of the Roman alphabet, Arabic numerals and other special characters. Words are created by rearranging letters in a word, alternating capitalization, over-usage of the letters H, X or Z. Superfluous as well as the presence of

silent letter In an alphabetic writing system, a silent letter is a letter that, in a particular word, does not correspond to any sound in the word's pronunciation. In linguistics, a silent letter is often symbolised with a null sign . Null is an unprono ...

s characterize its spelling convention. It has similarities with

Leet Leet (or "1337"), also known as eleet or leetspeak, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via reflection or other resemblance. ...

speak, primarily the alphanumeric nature of its writing.

Reaction

Several Facebook fan pages were created both in support and against the group. Celebrities such as Alessandra de Rossi,

Ces Drilon Cecilia Victoria Oreña-Drilon (; born July 8, 1961), simply known as Ces Drilon, is a Filipino broadcast journalist. She presented news and public affairs programs for the News and Current Affairs division of ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation ...

, and

Lourd de Veyra Lourd Ernest Hanopol de Veyra (; born February 11, 1975) is a Filipino musician, emcee, poet, journalist, TV host, broadcast personality and activist who became famous as the vocalist of the Manila-based jazz rock band Radioactive Sago Project. ...

have condemned the wholesale ridicule of the subculture. Due to the sudden existence of jejemons, 'Jejebusters' were created, a group of internet grammar vigilantes, typically Filipinos, dedicating their internet lives towards the eradication of jejetyping and jejemon existence.

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

videos were also uploaded parodying the Jejemons, connecting them to the 2010 election campaign. Edited television advertisements of Nacionalista Party proclaiming their disdain, and an

edited Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, orga ...

photograph of

Gilberto Teodoro Gilberto Eduardo Gerardo Cojuangco Teodoro Jr. (born June 14, 1964), nicknamed Gilbert or Gibo (), is a Filipino lawyer, politician and business executive who served as the Secretary of National Defense from 2007 to 2009 under President Gloria ...

with him holding a sign saying that the Jejemons should be "brought back to elementary school" went viral. In 2010, the Filipino

GMA Network GMA Network (Global Media Arts or simply GMA) is a Philippine free-to-air television and radio network. It is the flagship property of publicly traded GMA Network, Inc. Its first broadcast on television was on October 29, 1961. GMA Network (f ...

broadcast the situational comedy ''

JejeMom ''JejeMom'' is a 2010 Philippine television situational comedy series broadcast by GMA Network. Directed by Dominic Zapata, it stars Eugene Domingo in the title role. It premiered on August 14, 2010 replacing ''Claudine''. The series concluded ...

'', headlined by

Eugene Domingo Eugena Roxas Domingo (born July 23, 1971), popularly known as Eugene Domingo, is a Filipino actress, comedienne and host. She has performed in lead and supporting roles in various genres of the Philippine film industry. She is popularly known as ...

. In the same year, the late comedian

Dolphy Rodolfo Vera Quizon Sr. (; July 25, 1928 – July 10, 2012), better known by his stage names Dolphy, Pidol, and Golay, was a Filipino comedian and actor. He is widely regarded as the country's "King of Comedy" for his comedic talent embodied ...

starred and produced the film ''Father Jejemon''. As part of the pre-school year clean-up of schools for the upcoming 2010–11 school year, the

Department of Education An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...

(DepEd) strongly discourages students from using Jejemon spelling and grammar, especially in text messaging. Communicating with others using Jejemon "language" is said to cause deterioration of young Filipino students’ language skills.

Decline and a change of definition

From early 2013 onwards, with the rise of

smartphone A smartphone is a portable computer device that combines mobile telephone and computing functions into one unit. They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, whic ...

s which began to overtake

feature phone A feature phone (also spelled featurephone) is a type or class of mobile phone that retains the form factor of earlier generations of mobile telephones, typically with press-button based inputs and a small non-touch display. They tend to use an ...

s in terms of sales in the country, the phenomenon seems to have made a gradual decline in mainstream popularity. Some social media accounts use such spellings to this date, but most of them are used for sarcasm. The term "jejemon" would gradually shift definition to a

pejorative A pejorative or slur is a word or grammatical form expressing a negative or a disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect toward someone or something. It is also used to express criticism, hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a ...

term to describe a stereotype of poorly educated young people wearing hip-hop clothing, roughly similar to the British slang term

chav "Chav" (), also "charver", "scally" and "roadman" in parts of England, is a British term, usually used in a pejorative way. The term is used to describe an anti-social lower-class youth dressed in sportswear. * * * * "Chavette" is a related te ...

for sportswear.

References