Meme (cultural phenomenon)
The term meme (pronounced [miːm], plural memes ) summarizes various manifestations of a cultural phenomenon, which is characterized by the distribution of small media content with a mostly humorous , cheering or sometimes satirical and socially critical statement. The term comes directly from the English for meme , which describes individual perpetuating contents of consciousness.
This content can be self-created works, but also photographs, drawings, animations or films by other artists and media professionals that have been assembled or taken out of their original context. Memes appear in the form of moving and still images, text, video or even audio, so they are not tied to a particular type of media. Memes are mostly passed on from person to person via Internet platforms such as imageboards or video portals , chat rooms , Internet forums , messenger services , social networks , e-mail or even in physical form and therefore move on and on under sometimes anarchic conditions. In some cases they are further modified or combined with other content. Due to their viral distribution in net culture , memes are also described as an internet phenomenon.
description
Memes use various forms of expression. The punch lines range from simple and harmless word jokes to black humor and cynicism , which deliberately violates social norms and morals, and possibly also against political correctness . It deals with experiences from everyday life, strange reflections on current affairs, comments on cultural assets such as films, series, video games or songs, funny photographs or completely fictitious fantasy memes with an almost surreal character. Memes that are absurd and bizarre or use particularly black humor are also referred to as “thank you memes”.
While many memes are simply for easy and quick entertainment, there are also political memes that are directly related to current affairs and have a clear stance. For example, unpopular people from politics, administration, the military, business or culture are mocked, criticized or denounced in memes. It is increasingly possible to see memes that have been printed out or replicated at demonstrations .
Sometimes memes are used for viral marketing . The other way around, viral advertisements can also turn into memes.
etymology
In the popular science book The Selfish Gene , published in 1976, Richard Dawkins coined the English term meme to describe the dissemination of cultural information. Initially had meme only the importance Mem , but was in the wake of the digital revolution used for describing a particular type of Internet phenomenon. Dawkins commented on this use of his word creation in 2013 and said that these internet phenomena are not far from the original term.
The linguist Robert Sedlaczek notes that although the word meme is not in a dictionary, it is used for images or videos that are provided with a concise text in order to spread them quickly via social networks. They often relate to current, particularly political, events or to popular series or films.
Memes outside of the internet
Memes can also be found in the physical world due to their popularity. Some advertising agencies use the image, sound and text language of the memes in order to meet the target groups in an unusual way; for example, posters are designed in the style of an image macro. Outside of the internet, memes are mostly common in youth culture .
Copyright assessment
Again and again there is criticism that creating and distributing memes violates copyright law. Memes that use copyrighted content are not always original enough to be seen as legitimate re-use of the original work.
Basically, when a meme is published, regardless of whether it has been changed by writing or not, the copyright applies and the consent of the owner must be obtained. In practice, however, this is rarely the case, and as of March 2020 there has not yet been a conviction of a private individual who has posted a meme. In the case of memes on which private individuals can be seen, the right to one's own picture also applies, which makes publication more serious. Most memes, however, feature public figures or cartoon characters where the copyrights belong directly to the producers.
Some critics are demanding that on suitable for the dissemination of Memes platforms upload filters are used by media content prior to publication to check respect to possible copyright infringement. Others see such measures as an unjustified encroachment on freedom of expression and therefore criticize them under the hashtag #SaveTheMeme on social media.
literature
German
- Nils Dagsson Moskopp, Christian Heller: Internet-Meme: kurz & geek , O'Reilly Verlag , 2013, ISBN 9783868998054 (freely accessible as PDF )
- Limor Shifman: Meme: Art, Culture and Politics in the Digital Age, Suhrkamp Verlag , 2014, ISBN 9783518738078
- Lars Bülow, Michael Johann: Political Internet Memes - Theoretical Challenges and Empirical Findings, Frank & Timme , 2019, ISBN 978-3-7329-9464-9
English
- Anastasia Denisova: Internet Memes and Society: Social, Cultural, and Political Contexts, Routledge , 2019, ISBN 978-0-429-89065-9
- Limor Shifman: Memes in Digital Culture, MIT Press , 2014, ISBN 978-0-262-52543-5
- Tim Tyler: Memetics: Memes and the Science of Cultural Evolution, 2011, ISBN 978-1-4610-3526-8
- Susan Blackmore, Susan J. Blackmore: The Meme Machine, Oxford University Press , 2000, ISBN 978-0-19-286212-9
See also
- List of known internet phenomena
- Know Your Meme , online encyclopedia about individual memes
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b meme - definition of meme in English | Oxford Dictionaries. Retrieved January 26, 2017 (UK English).
- ↑ Chris Julien: Bourdieu, Social Capital and Online Interaction . In: Sociology . 49, No. 2, June 30, 2014, pp. 356-373. doi : 10.1177 / 0038038514535862 .
- ↑ Thanks to memes. In: Know Your Meme. Literally Media, Ltd., December 5, 2014, accessed July 16, 2020 .
- ↑ Richard Dawkins: The Selfish Gene . 2nd Edition. Oxford University Press, 1989, ISBN 0-19-286092-5 , pp. 192 (British English): 'We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation . 'Mimeme' comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like 'gene'. I hope my classicist friends will forgive me if I abbreviate mimeme to meme . If it is any consolation, it could alternatively be thought of as being related to 'memory', or to the French word même . It should be pronounced to rhyme with 'cream'. '
- ↑ Olivia Solon: Richard Dawkins on the internet's hijacking of the word 'meme'. How do you feel about your word meme being reappropriated by the internet? Condé Nast Verlag, June 20, 2013, accessed on January 9, 2017 (American English): “The meaning is not that far away from the original. It's anything that goes viral. In the original introduction to the word meme in the last chapter of The Selfish Gene, I did actually use the metaphor of a virus. So when anybody talks about something going viral on the internet, that is exactly what a meme is and it looks as though the word has been appropriated for a subset of that. "
- ↑ Robert Sedlaczek: A meme about the party in Ibiza . Wiener Zeitung, May 22, 2019
- ↑ Ute Dettmar, Caroline Roeder, Ingrid Tomkowiak: Interfaces in child and youth media research: current positions and perspectives . Springer-Verlag, 2019, ISBN 978-3-476-04850-9 , pp. 145 ff . ( google.de [accessed on January 3, 2020]).
- ↑ Aishwaria S Iyer, Raghav Mehrotra: A Critical Analysis of Memes and fair use . In: Rostrum Law Review . September.
- ↑ Tobias Röttger: Meme - Why the publication and distribution of memes on the Internet is (not) a problem. In: gulden röttger lawyers. gulden röttger rechtsanwälte GbR, June 26, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 .
- ↑ Save the meme! - Bits of Freedom. Accessed January 2, 2020 .
- ^ Joe McNamee: Copyright Directive: The EU wants to filter copyright violations more than terrorist propaganda. In: netzpolitik.org . netzpolitik.org e. V., March 27, 2017, accessed on July 16, 2020 .