Reflection 5: Memes + Social Media

Memes + Social Media

Today's lesson was about memes and social media. I don't know why but memes have been a popular trend of topic recently. According to the book called The Selfish Gene in 1976, a biologist who is Richard Dawkins, he stated that memes are the imitation pattern of a gene to pass on something genetically. There are people who get misunderstood between the relation of gene and meme. Here comes the difference. Gene is biologically while meme is not. Next, social media is defined as the technologies used to facilitate social interaction and collaboration according to Bryer and Zavatarro (2011). These techonologies include blogs, wikipedia, media, pictures and networking platforms such as Facebook.

Firstly, let me give some explanation of what meme really is. Meme can be defined as an image, video or catchphrase which spread rapidly by Internet users, often with slight variations. It transfers information via signs. Also, memes may not be something with a new concept. It can be a fashion trend, anything that related or influenced a person or group. Internet memes are now a subject studied at a social level. Furthermore, entertain mass audiences has proved that memes have a significant societal impact, especially on the way they impact are affected by current events and popular culture among the lives and culture of the young.

TWO DAYS TO COMPLETE COMMUNICATIONS PROJECT? SOUNDS LIKE TWO MORE DAYS OF CHILLIN' Lazy College Senior

Attached is one of the meme which I would like to share. It is a meme with a picture and caption. By seeing from the caption above, I can easily assume that the guy in the picture is a student. Next, I can know that this student is a lazy college student from the caption. I presume that he is a 'last minute' guy as the caption mentioned that he left two days to complete his communications project but the caption as well stated that it sounds like there are two more days of chilling. This means that the student is still relaxing, not worrying about the project and thinking he still have time to finish it. 

Meme is one of the way to express the expressions, meanings and thoughts. Moreover, people can use meme to point out their thoughts and feelings if they are shy or not comfortable with speaking it out to the others. Also, memes can represent the inside jokes, emotions and shared cultural reference from people as well. In this situation, memes can help represent the feelings easily by using a catchy picture or funny video. In addition, people do not necessarily have to be illiterate to understand meme. For instance, people can understand the humour by looking at the picture without having knowledge of the foreign language.

Possible ways of using memes in class:
  1. to emphasize key events / formulas
  2. admonish or emphasing rules
  3. ice-breaking activity
  4. discussion

Possible Drabacks:
  1. time and effort consuming
  2. relevant (image and text does not match)
  3. is it understood by majority

Below are some of the example websites for generating memes:
  • livememe.com
  • www.quickmeme.com
  • wigflip.com
  • imgflip.com


Reference

Meme (2017) Quickmeme [online] available from <http://www.quickmeme.com/> [20 March 2017]

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