Memes / Hyperreality

Memes is an area that is associated with hyper reality. Memes have blown up over the last few years due to the connectivity social media and the internet has brought us. Images, videos, a piece of text and more, can now be shared across the world at an amazing rate, with the touch of a button.

A meme is an idea, behaviour, or style that is shared from person to person within a culture. It acts as tool to carry cultural ideas, symbols, or practices that can be transferred to many people through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme. Its name derived from the Greek word 'mimema', meaning something imitated, according to the American Heritage Dictionary.

Although memes have notably rose and got a name for itself over the past few years, they have actually been around for many many years. The first meme created dates back to 1976, created by evolutionary biologist, Richard Dawkins. Dawkins described memes as a process to transmit social memories and cultural ideas to each other. However, the internet was not at the power it is today back in then and the capacity to share memes was limited.

Before the internet, Memes were spread physically. A notable meme that you may have heard of is the 'Kilroy was here' meme the American army used. It was a popular cultural expression in America, around the time of world war II. This meme was typically seen as graffiti on walls, drawn on by United States servicemen in places they were stationed, camped or visited. Leaving their mark as memorabilia in what ever destination they went.

Memes were also distributed by posters before the internet. In 1998, Stephard Faiery created the Andre the giant phenomenon. He created stickers and posters he would place all over the city environment. He did this in an attempt to stimulate curiosity and bring people to question both the sticker and its relationship with its surroundings. It re awoke a sense of wonder about the environment it was situated. It got people talking and questioning, achieving its goal of becoming a phenomenon and became a popular act in this time period. This has gave me an insight as to what memes actually are. They can be in physical form to, scattered around environments to connect people and bring together a social culture. Either posters, clothing, digital, its endless. This is good to know as I gather research to develop ideas for my project.