CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

The story of memes is crucial to the understanding of the digital culture, and not only as
characteristics of an Internet subculture, but as a cultural artifact that is gaining new meaning and
function as it is breaking more and more into the mainstream. Borzsei (2013) states that the
technological, sociological and cultural reason for the emergence of Internet meme culture was
so prevalent today. His research focused on remixed Internet Memes that is collaborative,
absurdist humor in multimedia forms.
The term meme with the emergence of the Internet was also applied to content that
spread from user to user online. Shortly, memes was consisting of inside funny jokes. In fact,
memes were generated to show the cultural counter part of the genes. Its primary meaning was
supposed to signify a unit of cultural transmission or a unit of imitation. (Dawkins,1976)
Internet meme is a piece of culture, typically a joke, which gains influence through online
transmission considered as the first definition of Internet meme was proposed by Patrick
Davidson (2009). According to Brodie (1996), he claims that memetics has uncovered the
existence of viruses of the mind, which are infectious piece of our culture that spread rapidly
throughout the population, altering peoples thoughts and lives. One of the earliest internet
memes was the emoticon (Davidson). Smiley quickly spread to other communities and it soon
became a meme. The sideways smiley face composed entirely of punctuation marks was
created on 19 September 1982 by Scott E. Fahlman. Emoticons display many definite
characteristics of Internet memes in a very minimalistic form. Thus, these emoticons became a
vehicle in communicating certain ideas
Next to the emoticons is experimentation with technology was the website Bert Is Evil,
which hosts images that can be considered examples of the first modern remixed Internet meme.
It was created by Dino Ignacio 1997, he is a Filipino artist and designer. Due to the Photoshops
accessibility (as a creative tool) it resulted in increasing number of private images appearing
online, right at the meme communitys disposal. The two famous instances Advice Dog and
LOLcats are both said to originate from 2006, and they proved very influential in shaping
todays meme culture. Evolving memes were the vehicle mostly for online jokes with little to no
serious content (Rushkoff 68). ). In the early 2010s, the Internet meme is one of the ways people
are addressing such issues. Internet memes also became a tool for lightening a political issues. .
Some of the memes were used to illustrate a particular political statement according to their
beliefs. Sometimes it was used to deliver political issues in a light approach using internet
memes. This only shows the creative way of delivering such issues and bringing it to norms as a
one way of expression.
Not everything that lies in the heart of every living thing are not a fire, not a warm
breath, nor a spark of life But it is the information, words and instructions, Richard Dawkins
declared in 1986. Dawkins coined the term meme in his book, The Selfish Gene; memes was
originally used to describe packets of cultural information that was adopted by the internet.
Memetics was a theory of mental content based on analogy popularly recognized with Darwinian
evolution originates on Richard Dawkins book of Selfish Gene in 1976. It was an approach to
the cultural information transfer. His examples was composed of catchy ideas in form of
behavior, styles, beliefs, tunes, catch-phrases, fashion etc.
As a matter of fact, a meme is an idea that is imitated spreading from person to person
within a culture or subculture by a process of transmission that is mediated. An internet meme is
a reduced idea that are imitated and spread rapidly from person to person via internet largely
through internet-based email, blogs, forums, image-boards, social networking sites, instant
messaging, and video streaming sites (Brunello 2012). Eventually, internet memes are becoming
the spoken language into to the online community. It is now part of our living, this can be greatly
recognize as a part of the word of mouth that people tends to share and use as a new form of
language.
In 2012, the Internet memes have become a part of vocabulary for internet users, and
undoubtedly, one of the most widespread modes of online communication, and it is not only the
emoticon anymore. Actually, these are virus of the mind that is based on everyday-creativity
agency that make them evolve through the creative works of individuals that are present today.
However, memes gained a peculiar form, namely of images, catchphrases and videos that consist
of a particular catchy idea that reify an active agent in the pursuit of replication. According to
Professors Knobel and Lankshear, Dawkins posited that memes were substantial evolutionary
model of cultural development and change grounded in the replication of ideas, knowledge, and
other cultural information through imitation and transfer. Hence, it is not only the replicability
that needs to be taken into consideration when analyzing a memes success, but also its remixing
qualities.
A study conducted by Knobel and Lankshear in 2007 focused on internet memes defines
them as a catchy and widely propagated ideas or phenomena; it was generated out of the
networks of shared interests, experiences, habits and worldviews. Their approach focused on
memes cultural phenomena. By means of content and discourse analysis they investigate some of
the most popular internet-memes. The outcome revealed that fecundity is improved when meme
mutates, as when people contribute to their own version.
According to Patel, memes are recognizable, bounded phenomena that have material
effects in the world and that can be scrutinized, and which develop through the production of
additional copies. He mentioned the three attributes that influence replicability which are fidelity,
fecundity, and longevity. Fecundity refers to the degree of reproduction and dissemination of a
meme; successful memes must achieve a high degree of fecundity. Longevity is also a key
element of replicability because the longer a meme exists, the more recognized it becomes, and
this recognition in turn enables easier reproduction, mutation, and dissemination Thus, an
Internet meme, like the meme described by Dawkins, evolves through imitation, reproduction,
and mutation. It is this constant spread and alteration that makes Internet memes so popular.

To keep up an internet culture, one must show an alternative of communication, a cost-
effective way of mass advertising to improve students media literacy the study of signs/symbols
(Kariko 2013). Through this, we are able to generate a new meaning. Memes contain humor,
universal emotions, social message, cultural message, political message etc. A study conducted
by Kariko (2013) states that through internet memes, people are capable in teaching a language
in the most effective way. The Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/) reports that
studying memes and their cultural impact has now become a legitimate area of research for some
institutions of higher learning. The study deals with the semiotic meaning of internet memes, on
how the image and the caption are used to create meanings to provide entertainment to user;
accompanied with variety of texts to create meanings that provide universal emotions (Kariko
2013). Sometimes, these captions only serve as a joke and entertainment purposes. This study
dwells on the context of the caption of specific memes and analyzes each on how it produces
different meanings. To sum it all up, internet meme serves as a humorous way of delivering fun
with context, words, images, meanings, symbols, culture, popular culture, etc. The fact that it
only needs an image of something or someone accompanied with a caption/text can generate
different meanings. This memes can be interpreted and customized anyway the user wants it
(Kariko 2013).
Image macro is a kind of Internet meme that start with an image and theme, such as Bad
Luck Brian, Good Guy Greg, or Philosoraptor. The year 2000s saw the development of
highly internet-specific meme production techniques especially image macros. Entering the
digital age, we cant deny the fact that internet memes are becoming part of our vocabulary.
According to Sean Rintel, one of the earliest forms of online memes was image macro it is a
picture with superimposed text; the etymology of the name image macro is important to the
basic concept of templating and how online memes themselves came to be successful. According
to Quickmeme, users are versatile in their meme us: they combine memes, they make them
evolve with different pictures or concepts, they use one meme against others. The meme is
successful to the extent that people participate by making more versions (Burgess 2008).
Nevertheless, there similar things that can be observed with Internet memes, they are
created, reproduce by millions of enthusiast around the world.