Memetics as informational difference: offering an information-centric conception of memes

Abstract

PurposeInformation scientists may find value in studying cultural information evolution and information diffusion through memetics. Information studies in memetics have often found datafication in memetics research difficult. Meanwhile, current memetic scholarship elsewhere is abundant in data due to their focus on Internet artifacts. This paper offers a way to close the datafication gap for information researchers by associating information data with “differences” between memetic documents.Design/methodology/approachThis work offers a joint theory and methodology invested in information-oriented memetics. This methodology of differences is developed from a content analysis of difference on a collection of images with visual similarities.FindingsThe authors find that this kind of analysis provides a heuristic method for quantitatively bounding where one meme ends and another begins. The authors also find that this approach helps describe the dynamics of memetic media in such a way that the authors can datafy information or cultural evolution more clearly.Originality/valueHere the authors offer an approach for studying cultural information evolution through the study of memes. In doing so, the authors forward a methodology of difference which leverages content analysis in order to outline how it functions practically. The authors propose a quantitative methodology to assess differences between versions of document contents in order to examine what a particular meme is. The authors also move toward showing the information structure which defines a meme.

Internet Memes of 2019—2021 as Current Phenomenon of Internet Communication: Meanings of Unity and Disunity

“…Превращение «потенциально меметической» информации в ИМ предполагает предварительную деконтекстуализацию (отчуждение от исходного социального / ситуативного / лингвистического контекста) и последующую реконтекстуализацию [Никитина и др., 2018]. То есть ИМ функционирует как изменяющийся шаблон, контекстуализируемый в разных коммуникативных ситуациях, присоединяющий варьирующуюся часть [Голованова и др., 2015;Изгаршева, 2020;Лысенко, 2017;Smith et al, 2021]. Т. Е. Савицкая выделяет следующие этапы в жизненном цикле успешного ИМ [Савицкая, 2013]: 1) ИМ активно реплицируется, не освободившись полностью от локального контекста; 2) ИМ превращается в популярный ИМ, освобождается от изначального контекста, подвергается последующим реконтекстуализациям, переосмыслению, упрощению (формирование мемо-дискурса с порождением новых надстраиваемых смыслов); 3) ИМ обретает общеизвестное содержание (возможно продвижение ИМ в офлайн-реальность, порождение материальных объектов), происходит пресыщение, переход в пассивное употребление.…”

Reinforming memes: a literature review of the status of memetic information

“…Recent memetic theory has begun reintroducing information as a central concept in memetics (Cannizzaro, 2016;Haig, 2020;Magarey and Trexler, 2020;Smith and Hemsley, 2022). Otherwise, there has been limited synthesis of what information does for memetics.…”

“…Neglecting clarity around information is a mistake. Confusion surrounds what the memetic information is and what it does for broader studies of cultural dynamics (Cannizzaro, 2016; Haig, 2020; Hannah, 2021; Magarey and Trexler, 2020; Seiffert-Brockmann et al ., 2018) and insinuates a relativism in IM (Lankshear and Knobel, 2019; Smith and Hemsley, 2022). As Blackmore states plainly, “if information is not copied through successive replications, with variation and selection, then there is no new evolutionary process and no need for the concept of the meme,” (2001).…”

On thresholds: signs, symbols and significance

“…The second theme focuses primarily on the application of semiotic ideas to specific areas, particularly in knowledge organization, and includes Atkinson (1980) with his conceptualization of bibliographic work as a Peircean sign system, Cronin (2000) with his suggestions regarding the insights and tools that semiotics offers for analysis of the indexical significance of bibliographic references and citations within the scholarly communication system, Mai (2001) with his description of how Peircean semiotics can be used to better illustrate subject indexing processes, Huang and Chuang (2009) with their examination of the dynamics and determinants of social tagging through the use of Peirce's 10 classes of signs, Latham (2012) with her development of a semiotics of museum objects, Friedman and Smiraglia (2013) with their discussion of how works may be viewed as instantiating either as static single instances or as more dynamic cultural icons which conform to the more mutable nature of Peircean symbols, Mingers and Wilcocks (2017) with their integrated semiotic methodology for information systems research, Smith and Hemsley (2022) with their application of Cannizzaro's material semiotic account of memetics into their own synthesis of meme transmission as datafied, differenced semiotic systems that cannot be reduced by human interpretation to a static, documented event, and Thellefsen (2022) with his comparison of Peirce's concept of the immediate and the dynamic object in semiotics to that of Bhaskar's notion of transitivity and intransitivity in relation to a proposed realist foundation for domain analysis and knowledge organization.…”