As our students’ consumption of internet memes through social media increases, a critical perspective toward these memes becomes increasingly important. Memes present teachers with a powerful and relevant way to approach critical analysis and discussion in the 21st‐century classroom. In this article, the authors present a framework for incorporating critical discussion and creation of memes into classrooms. Harnessing the power and prevalence of memes, the authors explore how internet memes can be used as a vehicle for critically engaging students. When they understand the characteristics that make memes an effective vector of cultural transmission, students can more critically recognize, consume, and produce these tools for humor and social and political critique.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.