BERLIN – Rayouf Alhumedhi, a 15-year-old Berlin teen originally from Saudi Arabia, is aiming to get developers to approve a Hijab emoji. According to a story published by washable.com, Alhumedhi drafted a proposal featuring a hijab to the emoji subcommittee of the Unicode Consortium, a nonprofit organization that develops and promotes software internationalization standards. 

Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian is one of the proposal’s co-authors. 

“The addition of the hijab emoji will prove to be a step forward in tolerance and diversity,” Alhumedhi wrote. “It is distinctive and holds a lot of spiritual meaning to millions of women across the globe, recognizing its importance will ultimately showcase great appreciation from the Muslim community.” The emoji is not aiming to represent Muslim women, but also women of Orthodox, Judaism and Christian faiths.  

Additionally, the proposal includes a male headscarf and three renderings of the clothing item on its own. 

“I would like to be represented and acknowledged,” said Alhumedhi.  “Because with the massive [number] of women that wear the headscarf today, there should be at least one place on our keyboards reserved for them.” 

The universal emoji keyboard has no similar offering, though one male character is depicted wearing a turban. 

Once Alhumedhi’s proposal is formally submitted, members of Unicode’s Emoji Subcommittee will need to approve it before it can be part of the official emoji keyboards. 

The approval process typically takes about a year and half, according to Unicode’s estimates. Proposals that are submitted by Oct. 1, 2016, will be considered for approval for the 2017 lineup of new emoji.