/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.16343258]

Boomer professor develops "a theory of the ontological nature of memes" such as "socially awkward penguin" and "batman slapping robin". Here is an excerpt.

>MemeCon (second pass): M is a meme if and only if M is a set of norms N for producing images such that the norms in N have come to be associated with each other through memographic practice and people produce images in accordance with N as part of that memographic practice.

>... For example, Feminist Ryan Gosling requires only that one use an image of Ryan Gosling in which he looks fetching. No specific such image is required. This is easily subsumed by the modified definition since the relevant norm may say either ‘use this particular image’ (as they do with our original examples) or ‘use any image of the following kind…’ (as they do with Feminist Ryan Gosling). Secondly, they also easily point the way to further refinement to encompass all kinds of memes, and not just image macros. The ontological answer can stand as is, since we have already dropped any requirement to include images in the second pass (only let us now refer to it as a ‘third pass’ to keep the levels of answers to the two questions aligned). All we need to do to effect the widening is to replace, in the conceptual answer, ‘images’ with some general term that can refer to any of the sorts of things that can be instances of a meme. I shall employ the term ‘things’ but other choices are available and I do not mean anything to ride on my decision:

>MemeCon (third pass): M is a meme if and only if M is a set of norms N for producing things such that the norms in N have come to be associated with each other through memographic practice and people produce things in accordance with N as part of that memographic practice.

[Anonymous No.16343262]

Forgot link

academic.oup.com/bjaesthetics/article/58/3/303/5061254

[Anonymous No.16343275]

>>16343258
Western universities must be destroyed

[Anonymous No.16343278]

Is this the power of academia?

[Anonymous No.16343324]

I don't know what people find wrong with this? It seems like a fine account. Memes exist as artifacts produced in accordance to a set of norms which are constitutive of their identity as that meme. Sure it isn't that interesting, but it doesn't appear wrong.

[Anonymous No.16343364]

>>16343324
What confuses me is why this needs publishing as anything other than maybe a fun blog article. There is nothing here but unnecessary formalisms. Ontological nature? Seriously? All he's done is described the social and cultural context of a meme. And he's done this based on a few image macros that your aunt posts on Facebook 5 years after they're already dead.

Plus honestly even if you're interested in academic scholarship on internet memes this is a bad analysis which shows nothing but a shallow understanding of internet culture. Exactly what you'd expect from someone paid an actual salary to write about zoomer stuff.

[Anonymous No.16343403]

>>16343324
>>16343364
yes, no one is critiquing that it is wrong but we are just commenting on why even do this?

you know what is would be really interesting? to make an "Ai meme generator" that actually can consistently mimic the effect of a good "internet cartoon"

[Anonymous No.16343441]

>>16343364
>Ontology: what kind of an existence does it have?
>Answer: memes exists as artifacts
i don't see how that isn't an ontological account. Artifacts are physical objects that have some kind of intentional property. For example, what separates distinguishes a statue from the lump of clay it is made of is precise that intentional property of the sculptor. And, being a product of an intention, is necessarily social in some dimension. A meme is an artifact made in recognition on that set of norms (ie. intentional practices). So i'm not sure why you would try to explain the ontological existence of a meme without reference to its social and cultural context.
I mean, i don't disagree that it isn't worth publishing. But i'm not sure what other account you would give. A token of a type? a mereological sum with disjoint parts (if you were a meme-monist)?
I'll be honest with you, i'm not interested in the academic scholarship on internet memes.

[Anonymous No.16343454]

>>16343441
I'd like to see an ontological analysis of smug anime girl.

[Anonymous No.16343462]

>>16343441
okay, that post reads like i'm have a stroke.
But in a publish or perish environment, why not shovel out easily written junk to keep the university bureaucrats at bay? perverse incentives create perverse outcomes.

[Anonymous No.16344007]

Shouldn't it be a boomer putting on a zoomer mask?

[Anonymous No.16344037]

The fuckin absolute state of academia

In other news: I finally hooked that crumb out of the lining of my gaming chair using a toothpick. This makes me happy

[Anonymous No.16344061]

>>16343258
Bowden is the only modern thinker to have correctly categorised memes in any way(his ideas are also a mix of an array of previous thinkers such as Carl Jung), though it could be argued he forgot the presence of truth for itself in the whole question. And he does it completely originally.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKOegBbx_Vk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mdmJnt63fc

[Anonymous No.16344743]

90% of memes aren't even in that format