Taking Internet Memes Seriously: A Literature Review (2005-2017) 1. Overview This paper aims to discuss the growing and dominant online phenomenon – internet meme by doing a bibliographic review of related theoretical and empirical research. This paper presents the review of recent literature (2005-2017) from various journals, magazine articles, and book sections. A bibliographic review is an essential phase of all scientific investigation, not only because it contributes in a decisive way to the compilation of empirical data to enable their interpretation, but also due to its contribution to the theoretical and methodological design (Contreras-Espinosa et al., 2012). The bibliography assessed here is chosen by quality and accessibility. I will begin by displaying the evolution and debate about the definition of Internet Memes (IM). I will then attempt to list and expand the main characteristics of IM that emerge from on the latest research conducted in this field. The last section of the paper will discuss my observations and further suggested studies/research in the media landscape. This paper aims to argue for meme literacy to be included in the limited traditional digital literacy definition and considered as an essential locus for cultural, civic and political participation for children and youth. 2. Defining Internet Memes (IM) The internet meme borrows its name from the from biological ‘meme’ coined by Richard Dawkins in 1976. According to Dawkins, ‘meme’ is a gene-like infectious unit of cultural transmission or imitation that spreads from person to person (Dawkins, 2016). He attributes three key features to a successful meme: Copy-Fidelity, Fecundity and Longevity. Most research (theoretical & empirical) reviewed in this paper, one way or the other derive or attempt to conceptualise internet meme through Dawkins ‘meme’. Therefore, to understand internet meme, it is important to expand on Dawkins successful ‘meme’ key features. The first key feature, i.e., copyfidelity, is identified by a strong core idea remaining intact despite numerous variations. The second key feature, i.e., fecundity is characterized by a rapid replication. The third key feature, i.e., longevity, is characterised by a sustainable replication pattern on a long-term basis. The ‘meme’ is known to carry gene and virus-like properties that spread from person to person and infects the mind. The original ‘meme’ by itself is ambiguous and sparked debate about its meaning and definition (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005). As pointed out by Shifman in his paper, the chief debate regarding ‘meme’ is the ambiguity on the issue of human agency and virality in the process of meme diffusion (Shifman, 2013). Although ‘meme’ itself is a much debated term, its similarity to the internet meme in itself cannot be overlooked through which scholars still define the IM phenomenon. To understand IM, it is imperative to address the first issue of human agency. As explained by Shifman, “on one end of the spectrum, we find scholars such as Blackmore (1999), who claim that people are ‘‘meme machines’’ operated by the numerous memes they host and constantly spread. The undermining of human agency is not inherent to the meme concept itself—only to one strain of its interpretation. Most important to this essay is Rosaria Conte’s (2000) suggestion to treat people not as vectors of cultural transmission, but as actors behind this process. The dissemination of memes, she submits, is based on intentional agents with decisionmaking powers: Social norms, perceptions, and preferences are crucial in memetic selection processes. This conceptualization of people as active agents is highly appropriate for understanding how memes travel on the digital highway” (Shifman, 2013). He then goes on to formulate the definition of IM, that also becomes the most cited definition across IM research, – “Internet memes are defined here as units of popular culture that are circulated, imitated, and transformed by individual Internet users, creating a shared cultural experience in the process.” He does so by defining IM by charting a communication-oriented typology of 3 memetic dimensions: content, form and stance. He isolates the three dimensions of cultural items that people can potentially imitate – content (of a specific text, referencing to both the ideas and ideologies conveyed by it), form (physical incarnation of the message, percieved through our senses such as visual/audible dimensions) and stance (the ways in which addressers position themselves in relation to the text, its linguistic codes, the addressees and other potential speakers). His definition which emphasizes on human agency in the circulation and transformation of internet memes is later reflected in the research conducted on IM role in articulating perspectives on OWS movement where IM portrayed polyvocality and each meme a user created or shared altered the discourse of the OWS online (R. M. Milner, 2013). The earliest definition of IM in the field of research is closely related to Dawkins ‘meme’. In their research about popular memes, Knobel & Lankshear loosely define IM as an online form of Dawkins ‘meme’ and base their research on the ‘successful memes’ that were strong enough to capture online and offline broadcast media attention (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005). Based on their empirical research, they concluded constitutive element of successful internet memes – humour, rich intertexuality and anomalous juxtapositions. From their research, they developed a typology of IM that categorised the memes into static memes (replicated with very little variation) and remixed memes (replicated via evolution, adaptation or transformation of the original meme vehicle). Although the IM considered in the research differ much more in definition now but it addressed one of the two key issues related to IM. As put aptly by Yus, the qualities of internet memes led some researchers to equate them to virals. However, there is only a partial overlapping between the qualities of memes and virals: the fact that both of them can be intentionally transmitted in an unaltered format. However, virals typically tend to spread beyond the user’s intention rather than intentionally. This is not possible in memes, which are intentionally created and transferred. Besides, memes are often altered by the free software available on the Net, whereas virals tend to spread unaltered (Yus, 2017). There have been further attempts to conceptualize memes using semiotics and epidemiology (Cannizzaro, 2016; Castaño Diaz, 2013). They further define internet memes as systems (similar to Shifman) where memes cannot be understood in isolation but in context with eachother. Some academicians also referred to online sources for definitions of IM (such as knowyourmeme) to explore the digital meme phenomenon but found them lacking in academically rigourous way (Cannizzaro, 2016). Online definitions of IM are highly debatable and subjective but one website knowyourmeme.com comes close to defining IM distinguishing from Dawkins ‘meme’ as arguing that content that is only shared and which has not changed or evolved while being passed on to others is viral content, and not a meme (Börzsei, 2013). Therefore, the definition of IM has evolved from being viral (static or remixed), typically a joke or humourous content on shared on digital platforms to systems of units of popular culture that are circulated, imitated, and transformed by individual Internet users, creating a shared cultural experience in the process. 3. Empirical Research on IM No. Research Name (Author) Purpose Methodology 1. Memes and affinities: Cultural replication and literacy education (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005) To identify key elements that appear to constitute each case as a meme, to establish some key categories of memes, and to discern qualities of 'contagiousness' and 'susceptibility' associated with these different online memes and how these are facilitated by electronic networks of communication. Discourse Analysis 2. The World Made Meme: Discourse and Identity in Participatory Media (R. M. Milner, 2012) Focus on three criteria indicative of cultural participation: processes, identities, and politics. Critical Discourse Analysis 3. Hacking the Social: Internet Memes, Identity Antagonism, and the Logic of Lulz (R. Milner, 2013) Empirical assessment of internet memes on 4chan and reddit, using the “logic of lulz” favouring distanced irony and critique at the expense of core identities, race and gender, focusing on content and tone in mediated public discourse. Critical Discourse Analysis 4. Pop Polyvocality: Internet memes, public participation, and the Occupy Wall Street movement (R. M. Milner, 2013) How memes articulated perspectives on OWS. 5. "There's no place for lulz on LOLCats": The role of genre, gender, and group identity in the interpretation and enjoyment of an Internet meme (Miltner, 2014) Exploring social & cultural forces contributing to meme’s popularity. 6. “You Can't Run Your SUV on Cute. Let's Go!”: Internet Memes as Delegitimizing Discourse (Davis, Glantz, & Novak, 2016) Examines Greenpeace’s Let’s Go! Arctic campaign, which opposed Shell’s Arctic oil-drilling plans through green-peace generated and user generated memes. Multimodal Discourse Analysis 7. “It Gets Better”: Internet memes and the construction of collective identity (Gal, Shifman, & Kampf, 2016) Conceptualizing “It Gets Better” body of videos as an Internet meme, examining the extent to which participants imitate or alter textual components presented in previous videos. Quantative Content Analysis & Qualitative Critical Analysis Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis Focus Groups 8. Laughing across borders: Intertextuality of internet memes (Laineste & Voolaid, 2017) How the carriers of Internet humour, that is, memes and virals, travel across borders, to a smaller or greater degree being modified and adapted to a particular language and culture in the process. 9. Internet memes as contested cultural capital: The case of 4chan’s /b/ board (Nissenbaum & Shifman, 2017) Explores the workings of memes as cultural capital in web-based communities. Qualitative Content Analysis Grounded Analysis & Netnography 10. Digital cultures of political participation: Internet memes and the discursive delegitimization of the 2016 U.S Presidential candidates (Ross & Rivers, 2017) Examine the visual discursive features of Internet memes in relation to the candidates for the 2016 U.S presidential election – Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Multimodal Discourse Analysis 11. Internet Memes as Polyvocal Political Participation (Ross & Rivers, 2017) Provide evidence of the multitude of ways that Internet memes developed and demonstrated political engagement parallel to the unfolding electoral process. Critical Discourse Analysis Much of empirical research in the field of IM has been qualitative content analysis. Most research have analysed internet memes in web-based communities. So far, only one reception research has been conducted among LOLCats internet meme enthusiasts to explore the meme’s popularity (Miltner, 2014). Much favoured (and suitable) methodology to analyse IM is the multimodal discourse analysis and critical discourse analysis. One of the latest research employs netnography and grounded analysis to analyse memes in an anonymous web-based community (Nissenbaum & Shifman, 2017). Grounded analysis approach seems like a lucrative methodology to further analyse and characterize IM in digital space across various communities and social media networks. 4. IM Characteristics The complied empirical research above addresses IM in various online digital spaces and various contexts, many of them being social movements faciliated by IM. Based on my analysis of the empirical research above, I have compiled a list of charateristics associated with IM and its major roles on the internet. 4.1 Cultural Artifacts to Contested Cultural Capital As borrowed from Dawkins ‘meme’, internet memes becomes cultural artifacts in the digital space, often borrowing from the offline and online world. IM encodes a recognizable element of cultural information, where cultural information is defined as some kind of meaningful idea, pattern, or chunk of ‘stuff’ that embodies and/or shapes some aspect of the ways of doing and being that are associated with belonging to a particular practice or group (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005). The cultural value they hold is very subjective as one particular internet meme may differ in meaning if placed in different online digital spaces (du Preez & Lombard, 2014; Yus, 2017). Memes as artifacts highlight their social and cultural role on the new media landscape. Whereas a cultural artifact offers information about the culture that creates and uses it (Watts, 1981), a social artifact informs us about the social behavior of those individuals or groups which produce it (Wartofsky, 1979). Memes as artifacts possess both cultural and social attributes as they are produced, reproduced, and transformed to reconstitute the social system (Wiggins & Bowers, 2015). The shift of internet memes from being a cultural artifact to cultural capital can be attributed to its popularity as agent of participatory media, easy remixing (Börzsei, 2013), and netizens’ constant effort to outdo each other’s creativity (Mina, 2014). The communication through visual means has resulted in the “language of memes”, a “visual vernacular” (Miltner, 2014). A clear example of IM being form of cultural capital is in the online community 4chan board where internet meme are a form of cultural capital that is required in order to assert a legitimate voice. Internet memes in this case become contested cultural capital as there is no marker to which measure what is right or wrong because of website’s emphemeral quality. (Nissenbaum & Shifman, 2017). The memetic practice is not merely an expression of existing social cultural norms, it is also a social tool for negotiating them. The relationship between memes and norms is thus twofold: memes both reflect norms and constitute a central practice in their formation (Shifman, 2014). Thus, even in other digital spaces, internet memes can be seen as contested cultural capital (& even mediated cultural artifacts) because of their unstable forms (a constant contradiction between convention & innovation) and transformatory nature to negotiate what is considered having social superior capital (Milner, 2012; Nissenbaum & Shifman, 2017). 4.2 Agents of Participatory Media The online sphere has provided an answer and replacement to exclusionary traditional mass media – participatory media. In the examined bibliography, IM are understood as agents of this free participatory media where people are now capable of shifting from passive culture consumption to active democratic culture production (Chen, 2012) as memes show that, even if at a low level, even if just for the sake of a joke, more and more people are engaging with the news and what is happening around them (Börzsei, 2013). As shown by Milner in his research – the internet meme could be a quintessential participatory artifact: open, collaborative, and adaptable. The technology required to create memes is often relatively simple and entirely free, requiring only that a willing participant know where to download the tools and where to upload the results (R. M. Milner, 2012). IM perfectly fit the vernacular of online digital communication, especially rooted in ‘philosophy of playfulness’, accessibility and transformability to address serious and non-serious content alike by individual users (Ekdale & Tully, 2014). In the words of Wiggins and Bowers, IM are are social and cultural artifacts that facilitate interaction between agent (individual user) and social system, thus being an important agent of participatory media (Wiggins & Bowers, 2015). In the empirical research, IM has been seen agents of participatory media – web communities (reddit, tumblr, and youtube), anonymous web communities (4chan board and the Cheezburger Network), and social media networks (facebook and twitter). Their creation is facilitated by various online tools available in the form of websites and downloadable free open source softwares. 4.3 Framing of Online (and Offline?) Identity Memes are often produced on sites where social collectives come together and define themselves at least loosely as a group (R. M. Milner, 2012). Therefore, IM become an expression of collective identity. IM spread on a micro basis but memes’ impact is on the macro: They shape the mindsets, forms of behavior, and actions of social groups (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007). As agents of participatory media, they become especially powerful in framing the online identity of the user. This is framing is both intentional and unintentional on the side of the user. Main aspects of social media, namely the content published, including memes in the form of text, images, and videos actively contribute to the online persona or identity of the user. Importantly, online personae influence the way in which offline personae are perceived (du Preez & Lombard, 2014). It is also important to note that same IM can be used to construct vastly different shared group identities (Miltner, 2014). Therefore, when an IM is shared by a user, he co-constructs his identity and his identity is co-constructed by his/her peers through the interpretation of the meme. This phenomemenon is described by Yus as networked individualism, standing somewhere in-between the joy of being individual and the joy of feeling the approval of the group. User-generated versions of a meme may serve both purposes: on the one hand, users who exhibit their individuality show they are digitally literate, unique, and creative. But at the same time, what they upload as individual often relates to common, widely shared rules or formulas. As a result, users simultaneously indicate and construct their individuality and their affiliation with the larger community (Yus, 2017) which reflects in the reseach of “It Gets Better” video meme (Gal et al., 2016). While IM construct the online identity of the user, there is no concrete empirical evidence suggesting its role in the framing of offline identity as well. The meme culture has given expression to our everyday aesthetics and expose new traits of media consumption (Börzsei, 2013; Chen, 2012; Katz & Shifman, 2017). Our everyday aesthetics are described as “fleeting, malleable, immediate”. The information overload of the current media does not permit longer engagement with one piece of news, as the next hour will supply with many new ones of which the internet meme is a poignant illustration (Börzsei, 2013). The memes are increasingly focused on instant gratification. They are produced to critique how the culture industry is producing worthless content lacking social value (Chen, 2012). The digital memetic nonsense does not merely reflect people doing silly things over the internet, it reflects the sheer enjoyment in subversiveness as it liberates participants from burdensome obligation to generate new meaning (Katz & Shifman, 2017). 4.4 Pop-Polyvocality Establishment of IM as cultural & social artifacts, agents of participatory media, and as framer of networked identities begets the question of whose experience & identity is being framed and in what forms. The empirical research in this paper points to IM being inherently appropriating popular culture, and a mix of old inequalities and new participation ((Knobel & Lankshear, 2005; R. M. Milner, 2012, 2013; Ross & Rivers, 2017; Shifman, 2014). Popular culture finds a special place in the memetic studies as it often employs popular media for various discourses (such as political, civic and environmental discourses in the case of current bibliography) and the most cited definition of IM calls itself a unit of popular culture. “A micro-level discursive analysis of memes can provide insight into the nature of public discourse as it occurs through the shared cultural discourses that so pervade our social engagement. When assessing the scope, structure, and tenor of mediated cultural participation, pop culture artifacts are not only sufficient. They are exemplary” (R. M. Milner, 2012). He further combines public discourse (populism) and popular discourse as core features of participatory media and thus, of internet memes. Although his work, primarily points towards internet memes combining both discourses mentioned above for political discourse and supporting social movements, he makes vary of internet memes contributing to alternative media and alternative discourses as well which essentially make it polyvocal in nature. A participatory media essentially facilitates an active polyvocal (inspired from Bakhtin) citizenship where previously marginalized will have a means to find information and engage in public conversation on more equal footing, wealthy in perspectives (R. M. Milner, 2013). Polyvocality among IM were analysed in North American perspectives and political and civic discourses in the selected bibliography which showed while diverse perspectives were present, they were relatively in a narrow frame and followed old hegemonies, making it a mix of new participation and old inequalities (R. M. Milner, 2012, 2013; Ross & Rivers. Damian J., 2017). Although it each subsequent research showed increased participation but within the bounderies of old hegemonic structure. Similar concern is expressed by Miltner in her research where internet memes that take popular discourse are also set by dominant forces that engage in problematic representations of marginal section of the community (Miltner, 2014). Therefore, though IM are essentially incorporate the popular along with dominant discourses, with each subsequent year they prove to be more participatory giving voice to alternative and marginalized voices with anonymity crucial in fostering increased participation (Ross & Rivers. Damian J., 2017). 4.5 Tool for Political & Civic Action or Discourse Internet memes have emerged as the champions of political and civic discourse in participatory media. As tools for political and civic action, the related empirical research has analysed them through subversive and delegitmizing discourses (Castaño Diaz, 2013; Chen, 2012; Davis et al., 2016; Ekdale & Tully, 2014; Gal et al., 2016; Huntington, 2013; Katz & Shifman, 2017; R. M. Milner, 2013, 2012; Mina, 2014; Procházka, 2014; Ross & Rivers. Damian J., 2017; Ross & Rivers, 2017; Szablewicz, 2014; Wiggins & Bowers, 2015) Most IM that are situated in everyday and the mundane or cultural media aim at social and political critique through parody or humorous appropriation (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005). The Internet meme as an online community’s cultural artifact actually helps to illuminate how they express values and share interests, which then leads to the fostering of critical judgment in the membership and even creation of political action (Chen, 2012). Memes show that, even if at a low level, even if just for the sake of a joke, more and more people are engaging with the news and what is happening around them. Memes can “tell the news”: sites like Memegenerator reveal that, to this day, the most popular memes at any given time will likely cover important news stories (Börzsei, 2013). In online participatory media, internet memes become the key agents and vernacular of political and civic participation, articulating perspectives. While in the West, they become essential tools for civic movements and commentary for the political, they become essential tools in political action in nondemocratic countries like China in voicing dissent and transforming passive Kenyan citizens to active participating citizens by enagaging in implicit & explicit political commentary (Ekdale & Tully, 2014; Mina, 2014). Internet memes provide an entry point, sometimes even the first exposure to topical “hot” and debated issues, mixing critical commentary with absurd meta-comments. Memes can be political – they do more than just criticise – they involve people (Laineste & Voolaid, 2017). As an agent of participatory media giving rise to polyvocality, the IM become an important tool for political and civic action or discourse having real impact on the offline & online world. Though, internet meme display a real potential for a utopian public sphere, the reality is still far as IM challenge the hegemonic voices but simultaneously create problemtic discourses based on gender, race and ethnicity (Gal et al., 2016; R. Milner, 2013; R. M. Milner, 2012; Szablewicz, 2014). 5. Redefining Digital Literacy While memes the processes of making memes are open to all, they require literacy to engage (R. M. Milner, 2012). The importance of ‘meme literacy’ was emphasized by Knobel back in 2005 where she challenged the traditional web 2.0 digital literacy definition inclusive of only what it means to be a competent user of new technologies and networks – “increasingly, digital literacy is being defined by policy groups and others as either technical competence with using computers and the internet or as the ability to evaluate information by examining sources, weighing up author credibility, assaying the quality of writing and argument building in an online text, judging the ‘truth value’ of a text found online, and so on. Many of the successful memes included in this study would be discounted or ignored by digital literacy advocates because they do not carry ‘useful’ information, despite the unquestionable fecundity and replication of each meme. Digital literacy mindsets do not pay adequate attention to the importance of social relations in developing, refining, remixing and sharing ideas in fecund and replicable ways, or the role memes themselves play in developing culture and creativity” (Knobel & Lankshear, 2005). She further introduced the concept – memetic engineering, creation and releasing of a positive counter-meme in response to harmful memes. When Knobel proposed this concept, the definition of IM was different than it is currently. Besides, Milner’s research on the Logic of Lulz revealed that while repressive and abusive trolling is antagonistic and counterproductive to public discourse, the practice can have its productive, agonistic dimensions as well, though, this awareness shouldn’t preclude acknowledging the very real inequalities that persist (R. Milner, 2013). Therefore, IM are complex systems where multiple and vastly different groups use them with different meanings and intentions (Miltner, 2014). This makes IM even more complex and important to digital literacy. The subversive and often ironical tone of the IM can lead to moral panics that undercuts its primary meaning. The features of IM that facilitate polyvocality such as anonymity, populist discourse and satirical humour may lead to violence, bullying, and sharing of controversial & false ideas. While communication through memes could lead to misunderstandings, users who have enough knowledge of memes and how they operate, are able to successfully communicate online using them (Grundlingh, 2017). Apart from their varied interpretability, IM enjoy global collaboration (virtually unlimited means of creating and altering them by a virtually unlimited number of people) and IM change as their defining technologies change (the means of creating and altering memes are regularly expanding in parallel with the development of new technologies) (Procházka, 2014). Therefore, IM is still an evolving concept that has gained an important place in mainstream participatory media. The present children and youth are, what Prensky calls, digital natives (Prensky, 2001). He suggested that these humans, who grew up surrounded with digital gadgets and internet, changed their consumption patterns and lifestyles. IM reflect an important part of the budding and ever-growing vernacular and habits of the digital natives. It can be stated that all the stages of meme communication, one way or another, impact the user’s identity, which is essential in today’s society, where physical areas for the shaping of identity are frequently exchanged for virtual scenarios which are the locus of many interactions and the place where information sharing and spreading mainly take place nowadays (Yus, 2017). Therefore, their inclusion in the current digital literacy definition becomes imperative. Research on children’s right show that they hold a powerless position in the society (Morrow & Richards, 2007). The Youth’s disillusion with contemporary politics has been an alarming prospect among party leaders (Carter, 2005). Through IM and participatory media, digital natives are siezing the means and production of media consumption. Considering IM which are invertly or indirectly political, simply silly, nonsensical, antagonistic or a joke, is ignoring the voice of the youth that expresses their identity crisis or creativity through playful and populist discourse. Furthermore, the moral and media panics around internet trolling (of which IM are a chief agent) research shows that nature of how trolls and trolling are presented varies between different new sources which suggests the moral panic is presented to different audiences based on the gratifications they get from consuming them (Bishop, 2014). In the article “Beyond Media Panics”, the authors suggest that much notion of media panics is laden with theoretical baggage that does not match the empirical research (Buckingham & Jensen, 2012). According to Cavagnero – the new generation of digital natives enjoy control over their use and production of media, which goes beyond the control that some journalists may be comfortable with (Cavagnero, 2012). Therefore, it is time for time for taking internet memes seriously and to include them in the limited digital literacy which is unequipped to understand their importance and role in the contemporary world – online and offline. Most importantly, they are the vernacular of contemporary Youth who have a right to be listened and their thoughts & feeling in this, to be taken into account. 6. Further Suggested Studies The assessed bibliography in this article has shown tremenduous research in the field of IM in articulating the concept and roles of memes online. While the present research has played an important role in uncovering internet memes, it also suggests further empirical research to be conducted. While Shifman suggests conduction of empirical research to provide a comprehensive overview of prevalent assumptions, norms, and ideologies behind the memtic construction in the digital culture (Shifman, 2013), Miltner questions the dominant discourse set my early adopters (white male, in this case) and suggests an empirical recpetion study in order to find out whose experience is being resonated in a polyvocal participation medium (Miltner, 2014). Many further suggested studies include a detailed empirical research on the proposed theoretical theories presented by scholars in the this field which points to a major gap in knowledge. Another potential gap in the field of internet memes is IM’s intertextuality and construction in the Global North & Global South which is highlighted through difference between Makmende meme creation in Kenya compared to Gobal North (Ekdale & Tully, 2014). The authors who analysed Makmende internet meme warn researchers to postulate any general findings on internet meme, and emphasize their role and significance within its national & cultural context. In their own words, “Therefore, this study demonstrates that the overrepresentation of internet users in the Global North can bias our understanding of participatory culture in the Global South. Global media theories cannot ignore cultural differences and prominence within the local context but, rather, should seize the rich data afforded by case studies for refining emergent concepts and theories, such as those about internet memes” (Ekdale & Tully, 2014). 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