Decades before Internet forums were plagued by funny cat photos, in 1976 to be precise, an evolutionary biologist by the name of Richard Dawkins wrote an incredible book titled The Selfish Gene. Now, you might be wondering why this is relevant. Well, bear with me for a moment, because this is mind-blowing.
The Selfish Gene's thesis could be summarized as "all life evolves by the differential survival of replicating entities". This means that genes, not individuals, are the basic units of life. So neither you nor anyone else is subjected to natural selection, but our genes are! And then Dawkins took it one step further and he extrapolated the concept of genes to those of human culture.
He took the word 'gene' (genetical unit) and working with the Greek word mimeisthai (μιμεῖσθαι, 'to imitate') he changed it into 'meme' to describe the basic unit or building block of human culture. He would argue that in the same way genes reside in our cells, memes reside in our nervous systems (in our brains) and, also remarkably important, they are subject to a constant competition to survive and spread, too (yes, this means they are alive).
So what exactly is a meme? Well, it can be a tune, a thought, an image, a concept as simple as it can get, but strong enough to get stuck in your head until it replicates.
Is this the real life?
Is this just fantasy?
If you have thought of Bohemian Rhapsody right now, you are on your way to see what this is all about. That song, considered by many (including me) as the greatest song of all time, works perfectly well as a meme. And why is that? The tune and the lyrics are catchy enough to make you repeat it and spread it. It is so good in so many different ways that people would willingly create and propagate modifications and new versions of it. Some are serious and of great quality, others can be slightly different and you can even find parodies (looking at you, Weird Al Yankovic). But all of them play by the same rules: they compete against every other tune out there to take up some limited and precious space in our nervous systems against those other poor songs that will forgotten.
Now, what about that 'viral' bit in the title?
We consider a meme to be viral whenever its propagation rate is higher than normal. That means, when individuals are 'infected' by it and share it massively followed by an also abnormal reception. The term 'viral' does not mean it is necessarily good or bad, it only implies how fast and stable the propagation of a particular meme is.
Internet memes
What we know as Internet memes are just a natural evolution of the concept of 'meme' coined by Richard Dawkins. Such memes come in different formats, but the most popular are image-based memes (with alternative texts) and video-based memes often paired with a tune where both the video structure and the tune have a meaning in the community by themselves.
One oldie but goodie example is the meme series "Play him off, Keyboard cat".
In this video we can see a definite structure: something unfortunate happening followed by a cat playing the piano and a slow-motion repetition of the unfortunate event. This Internet meme was probably one of the first to convey meaning through a tune, turning a simple melody into a very particular message: oopsie!
A more recent and surely more recognizable version of that concept is the Coffin Dance. This meme works in such a way that seeing the pallbearers can automatically trigger the tune in your mind, and it works the other way around, too! No matter how it happens, it always conveys the same meaning.
Viral Education
Simple and complex at the same time, memes can become an incredible teaching tool. We can use them to communicate a short and precise message through images, videos or music and the ideas behind them.
Even though memes are arbitrary we must always follow some basic semiotic rules depending on the meme itself and its format to avoid cringe, dankness or unintended shitposting. In this sense, memes work exactly the same as words. And now the line between words and memes begins to blur as the image of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations appears with the idea of Language Games. Oh my, oh my... So words are memes? Are they also alive? Are languages living creatures? Well, I do think so! But let's leave this for another post.
The idea here is to create memes for education and to make them viral enough to work so they convey meaning in an informative way while still working as memes. In order to do so we must first simplify the message to its most basic bits, choose the adequate meme format (text, image, video, audio) and put it all together. Sometimes it will work, sometimes it won't. Practice makes perfect!
References and further reading
Dawkins, R (1976): The selfish Gene.
Wittgenstein, L. (1953): Philosophical Investigations. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/54889e73e4b0a2c1f9891289/t/564b61a4e4b04eca59c4d232/1447780772744/Ludwig.Wittgenstein.-.Philosophical.Investigations.pdf
Know Your Meme. Internet Meme Database. https://knowyourmeme.com/
Meme Studies Research Network. University of Edinburgh. Center for Data, Culture and Society. https://www.cdcs.ed.ac.uk/research-clusters/digital-social-science/meme-studies-research-network
Great post, I love the title! So original and there is no doubt it will help lots and lots of teachers. Memes are fantastic. Thank you!