Russian Resistance and Propaganda through Memes in the 2010s

Denisova, Anastasia

doi:10.4324/9780429469404-6

Cited by 3 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…Scholars have described the humorous nature of memes as working both in concert with and against generative political discourse. Some, for instance, have expressed concern that the simplicity of meme humor restricts the ability of the genre to stimulate meaningful discussion; rather, they argue memes serve primarily as “in-jokes of digital communities” (Denisova, 2016). Others, however, have argued that memes use playfulness to connect the humorous to the political in a way that allows users to disrupt and challenge political thinking (Mortensen & Neumayer, 2021).…”

Section: Motivations To Circulate Political Memesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…On Instagram alone, approximately 1 million memes are shared daily, demonstrating their significant impact (Brown, 2022). Due to their typically brief use of text, emphasis on humor, and frequent use of mimicry, memes are often seen as frivolous and lacking in their capacity to communicate sophisticated ideas (Denisova, 2016). Moreover, while memes are known for their rapid circulation online, only a small number of them “go viral,” making it easy to overlook memes as an important source of political opinion and information.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Memeing Politics: Understanding Political Meme Creators, Audiences, and Consequences on Social Media

Halversen,

Weeks

2023

Social Media + Society

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Political memes have become a common way for people to be exposed to political content and express their political views online. However, little is known about who shares political memes online or whether exposure to memes is associated with key attitudinal, emotional, and behavioral political outcomes. To address these gaps, this study uses data from a two-wave survey (YouGov) of American adults fielded during the 2020 U.S. presidential election ( N = 1800) to investigate (a) predictors of creating and sharing political memes on Facebook and (b) associated outcomes of exposure to political memes on Facebook. Results reveal that sharing political memes is a form of political expression employed by a variety of people in the United States, including political moderates and people both politically interested and noninterested. The data suggest that people who circulate political memes are motivated to make fun of politicians, but also to persuade and inform others in some cases. Results also highlight potential consequences of exposure to political memes, such as heightened online opinion expression, political participation, and anger toward the opposing presidential candidate. Taken together, the results provide insights into how people engage with memes and their associations with key political outcomes and offer an important foundation for future work on the effects of political memes.

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Section: Motivations To Circulate Political Memesmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Memeing Politics: Understanding Political Meme Creators, Audiences, and Consequences on Social Media

Halversen,

Weeks

2023

Social Media + Society

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“…Although an Internet meme is a relatively recent phenomenon (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007), it is already an established concept in the context of several subject fields, such as media, visual culture, historical and political sciences. Thus, contemporary researchers acknowledge the importance of an Internet meme upon studying it from different analytical angles (Makhortykh, 2015; Milner, 2013a, 2013b; Shifman, 2014a; Wiggins, 2016), while some scholars examine it as a fully fledged genre, inherent to online communication (Denisova, 2016; Wiggins & Bowers, 2014). Most broadly, an Internet meme is defined as a ‘catchy idea’ that circulates online through images, texts, videos, tunes or other digital ‘stuff’ (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007, p. 201).…”

Section: The Structure and Functioning Of Digital Memesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They entertain users through playfulness and absurd ideas that carry either ‘a little [of] “serious” content’, or no seriousness at all (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007, p. 217). In recent studies of ‘memetics’, scholars identify humour as a key feature that helps memes to achieve popularity on the Internet (Berger & Milkman, 2012; Denisova, 2016; Knobel & Lankshear, 2007; Radchenko, 2013; Shifman, 2014a). According to Shifman (2014a, p. 66), humorous memes constitute a prevailing category of digital memes due to users’ tendency to share comical, laughable items, which ‘make others feel good’.…”

Section: The Structure and Functioning Of Digital Memesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…By sharing and modifying them, users display their attitudes towards current agenda. In this way, for instance, people can criticise modern policies or question seemingly unfair legislation, show either support or dissatisfaction with the ruling party, as well as subvert (‘troll’) dominant discourse through mockery (Denisova, 2016; Miekle, 2016, pp. 64–68), precisely through practices of stiob that were described in detail above.…”

Section: Public Commentarymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Between Humour and Public Commentary: Digital Re-appropriation of the Soviet Propaganda Posters as Internet Memes

Kalkina

2020

Journal of Creative Communications

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Over the last two decades, Russian Internet accumulated a range of images originating from the Soviet epoch, including everything from official portraits of Soviet leaders to representations of Soviet greeting cards and postage stamps. While some of those digitised items remain intact, others become a part of different creative practices inherent to online environment, such as photo manipulating, remixing, recombining and merging with elements attributing to other historical or national contexts. The current article investigates one instance of creative re-appropriation of the Soviet visual legacy on the Internet: construction of digital memes from the former Soviet propaganda posters. Upon focusing on three iconic posters, namely Did you Volunteer? (1920), Do not Talk! (1941) and Motherland is Calling! (1941), this study examines how the propaganda images have been transformed by contemporary Russian users into ‘templates’ for meme-making. Furthermore, the article identifies two particular functions of memes based on the Soviet propaganda posters: first, as a form of a peculiar humour, known in Russian tradition as stiob and, second, as an instrument for voicing of public opinion, through which users comment on urgent political and social issues. The article concludes that the remakes of Soviet propaganda images do not fall within any hitherto discovered category of humorous, political or historical memes, and therefore, they should be considered as a separate case in contemporary production of memes.

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Humorous memes for Covid-19 communications and carnivalesque functions

Kabingue,

Licen,

Mangompit

et al. 2023

HCMCOUJS - SOCIAL SCIENCES

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This study described the types and functions of humor in memes during the Covid-19 pandemic to have a better understanding of the content and the role of humor during a crisis. This study identified the general ideas that emerged from the Bisaya memes including the types and functions of Bisaya humor. Using the qualitative and research methods, the results revealed the general ideas which included health practices, security, and health behavior. Comparison, pun, and exaggeration predominated which could be attributed to the Filipinos’ creativity and fondness of vivid images and by virtue of its repressive colonial history. For carnivalesque functionality, the exposition of social inequities, therapy, and subversion of social order prevailed. These imply the Filipinos’ dissatisfaction with the government’s programs, fight against information disorders, and parodying hierarchic authority in a comical manner. Consequently, memes cannot reflect Filipinos’ knowledge of the pandemic because this is a new experience for us. Memes can express the basic needs of the people/platform to express our experiences brought by the pandemic. Lastly, humorous memes serve a dualistic function in the study: they both delight and criticize.

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Russian Resistance and Propaganda through Memes in the 2010s

Cited by 3 publications

References 1 publication

Memeing Politics: Understanding Political Meme Creators, Audiences, and Consequences on Social Media

Memeing Politics: Understanding Political Meme Creators, Audiences, and Consequences on Social Media

Between Humour and Public Commentary: Digital Re-appropriation of the Soviet Propaganda Posters as Internet Memes

Humorous memes for Covid-19 communications and carnivalesque functions

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