The confines of Internet memes

The diffusion of any digital memetic content is rather simple because Internet memes do not confine themselves to a specific geographical place, one single state, nation or city. Internet memes have the power to cross all geographical borders and facilitate a transnational spreading of memes (Shifman, 2014). According to Shifman (2014), some investigations showed that, other than expected, memes do not eradicate space and distance, but they are deeply ingrained in social, cultural and linguistic contexts. Therefore, this global power does not only rely on the technical advance though, but also on the huge network of users’ practices and decisions, that lead to a meme’s global success. Memes have become an important factor concerning the topic of globalization, not only by creating a meme culture and globally connecting people all over the world, forming meme communities etc., but also by spreading cultural knowledge by showing the uniqueness of various local cultures (Shifman, 2014). In fact, the Cambridge Dictionary defines globalization as

“the development of closer economic, cultural, and political relations among all the countries of the world as a result of travel and communication becoming easy”

(Cambridge, 2021).

Some people claim that these global streams always go from the western part of the world to the eastern part. Assuming that these assertions are true, this would mean that it is mainly the Western part of the world profiting from globalization, serving their cultural and political interests mostly (Shifman, 2014).

Another factor that could indicate the western and especially American supremacy on the Internet is language. English is not only the lingua franca worldwide, it is also the interlanguage on the Internet. This led to the concern, that the digital media might promote linguistic imperialism, making the English language even more powerful while threatening the status and importance of other (minor) languages. Luckily, the dominance of the English language on the Internet is slowly decreasing. Referring to the assertion of English being the interlanguage on the Internet, one might not be able to understand posts, E-mails etc. that are not available in their L1 (Shifman, 2014).

Shifman (2014) brings up the term user-generated globalization though, stating that memes are translated, adapted and newly shared by numerous ordinary internet users, who aid the worldwide diffusion and circulation of memes. Together with some colleagues, she investigated this user-generated globalization by focusing on the translation of jokes that one finds on the internet. On the example of a joke, they found out that out of the nine most commonly used languages on the Internet (Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, French, German, Portuguese, Arabic,

Korean and Italian), the joke was translated into 8 of them. Both, the global aspect, as well as a certain degree of glocalization became evident in the results of the research. The joke spread globally and contained a few local adjustments.

Moreover, she and her colleagues observed and analyzed the translation of a hundred English jokes that have been translated into the languages most spoken by internet users. What becomes apparent is this investigation, is that the results are connected to cultural proximity. Languages, which were closer to the western culture or had more in common with western cultural habits, were on top of the list, having been translated several times. There have been found less translations of the jokes in languages that are spoken in the Asian or African part of the world.

Some jokes might therefore be less frequently translated due to cultural differences. (Shifman, 2014)

Nevertheless, there are two main topics that make a joke become globally successful: gender differences and consumption. Generally, it can be said that internet jokes promote Americanization and westernization, but not all cultures participate in this process of westernization and keep themselves distanced from it, as, for example, Japan or Korea.

(Shifman, 2014)

The comparison of such jokes, which can easily be presented in form of a meme, can also be used in the educational context in order to make students aware of cultural and linguistic differences between various cultures. This could also be done with puns, for example.

Assuming that a class studies English and Italian, the teacher could present a joke in both languages and let the students figure out eventual differences regarding the humorous effect of it. The students can also analyze differences in regards to cultural aspects that are being used in the respective jokes. Hence, the reason for using specific cultural elements in a specific language can be discussed. Concerning puns, which can also appear in a meme, students can be made aware of the linguistic differences of languages by making a literal translation of the respective puns. The humorous effect of puns and jokes due to linguistic appropriateness can be stressed. By linguistic appropriateness, I mean rhymes, the phonology or morphology of a word and other linguistic features that can influence the humorousness of a joke or a pun.

Shifman (2014) distinguishes between two theories of meme based global prevalence, one focusing on linguistic memes and the other concentrating on visual and audiovisual contents.

The research on internet jokes that has just been briefly discussed portrays the global and glocal distribution of linguistic memes. In contrast to linguistic memes, visual and audiovisual memes are more likely to cross all borders and be transnational. This does not mean that visual and

audiovisual contents do not exhibit features of localization. Shifman (2014) lists the “Successful Black Man” as an example: a meme that shows a black man, a short text at the top of the picture and a short text at the bottom of the picture. The top text hints at negative associations with black skin color and hence makes aware of the problem of racism, while the bottom text contradicts all negative clichés that are built (up) with the text on the top, in order to disprove the negative stereotypes. An example for a text at the top would be “Let’s all get high” and then the text at the bottom would follow saying “grades on our finals”. What renders this meme funny and humorous, is the collision of two very diverging “scripts”, as Shifman (2014) calls it: one evoking racist feelings and negative expectations and the other confuting this racist belief.

Such memes can be used for teaching about and making students aware of racism. The evident divergence of two texts being used in one single meme excellently highlight the problems of racism and negative associations with certain communities in today’s society. Memes, such as the “Successful Black Man” could make students aware of the inappropriate depiction of and prejudices against certain people in today’s society. The respective prejudices can be discussed and other existing prejudices can be addressed by modifying such memes through text. By this, I mean the replacement of the existing text by any other statements that do both, evoke racist feelings and confute the racist beliefs and negative expectations. By doing so, students have to deal with and use the target language in order to accomplish the task successfully, while also having to think of prejudices in today’s society that do not reflect reality though.