Internet memes

Being that it’s the 21^st century, everyone has a device that allows them to connect to the internet and interact with the media via Facebook, twitter, Instagram, snapchat etc. If you are in any of these social medias I’m 100% sure that you are aware of the current trend of the internet memes.

Memes are shared all over the media and have made their ways to print. Sometimes at a restaurant of a random bulletin board you might see an internet meme. I know that for me, I see them at work. We have this bulletin board in the office where each week a new meme is posted expressing an idea, a current even or just simply for humor reasons.

Memes have also been going on for a long time. As early as WWI. According to Davison one of the most popular “meme” was the regular happy face :-). Before given the name meme they were known as emoticons. Emoticons were used to “frame content as positive or negative, serious or joking, or any number of other things” (124). The reason this emoticon started was because of “Members who participated on the bulletin-board system at Carnegie Mellon [that’s] would on occasion descend into “flame wars”—long threads of communication that are hostile or openly aggressive to other users” (124). Because people misinterpreted their “humor” they tried to use emoticons to less offend the people. Later the emoticons kept evolving and have become this things that we know now as meme. And until this day sometimes people are still offended.

In the Article “The Language of Internet Memes” Patrick Davison suggest that a successful meme consist of three components. The first one is manifestation. Davison says that “the manifestation of a meme is its observable, external phenomena. It is the set of objects created by the meme, the records of its existence” (123). In other the background story of the meme, its context. The second component is the behavior, “The behavior of a meme is the action taken by an individual in service of the meme” (123). The action the person takes to create the meme what do they do with the picture to make it interesting? What does the picture consist of? And the final concept that Davison suggest that makes a successful meme is the ideal, “The ideal of a meme is the concept or idea conveyed.” (123). What is the idea that you want the meme to express?

One of the internet memes that I’m obsessed with are the “Kermit the Frog” memes. The reason I’m obsessed with this meme is because of the message they express, “shade”. The first line of the meme gives a real life problem and the second line closes with “but that’s none of my business” with the frog drinking a cup of tea. I don’t know about you but this reminds me of when you are gossiping with your friends and you are throwing shade at an event or to another friend. Or it just reminds you of that nosy aunt that “doesn’t like drama” but she is the one that starts all of it.

As Davison expresses the concepts of the meme I realized that this meme fits into the three concepts. The meme manifestation because we know where the meme comes from. It also has a behavior. Each Kermit the Frog meme changes which helps to express different ideas, just the way Davison suggests that a successful meme should be.

I agree with the three concepts that Davison mentions but I also would like to add that the reason a meme is successful is because one can relate to them. Once the meme becomes relatable it becomes memorable just like the authors of “Memes and Affinities” Knobel and Lankshear express in their article.

Throughout their essay they express the idea that it’s a new way of communicating that creates a connection with the audience that it becomes memorable. Maybe to one the meme becomes memorable because of something the picture has like a face expression, colors, movie screenshot or even just the text of the meme.

Some memes have had great impact on people that sometimes you don’t even need the famous lines to be written on the meme because you know the idea that the meme is trying to convey. For example, the meme to the left just shows the image and a small text. Without even needing the famous line of “but that’s none of my business” you already know what the meme is conveying. When you know longer need those phrases in the meme that’s when you know that this meme has accomplished both the ideas of Davidson, Knobel and Lankshearideal “successful” meme.