Hypermedia Pedagogy

Table of Contents

• Lessons from the Memeosphere
• Memes as Infographics
  • Analogy
  • Dissonance
  • Repetition With Variation
  • Détournement and Culture Jamming
• Examples
• Educational Memes in Different Spheres
  • Public Sphere
  • Communities of Learning & Communities of Memeing
  • Social and Interpersonal Interactions
  • Individual Learners
• Models of Mentorship
  • Emotions of Learners
• Conclusion
• Works Cited

Lessons from the Memeosphere

At first glance, one might assume that trying to force educational topics into Internet memes sounds like a heavy-handed, culturally illiterate attempt to control the discourse of young people. Or, conversely, to some it may sound like a complete mockery of the intellectual rigor, standards, and legitimacy of academia. I want to dispel both of these notions.

Academic Memepages are primarily run by undergraduate and graduate students, themselves deeply steeped in both meme culture and academia. Educational memes are a celebration of both the academic and the comedic, neither half being superior or inferior. Both sides enrich each other, and enrich the community as a whole.

In fact, there is a very important reason why academic subject matter actually works very well with memes: many kinds of humor rely on the subversion of expectations, on reframing the setup and surprising the listener with an unexpected, jarring and incongruous punchline. Oftentimes, the more esoteric and unexpected the punchline, the funnier the joke. In the context of humor, the obscurity, seriousness and complexity of academic concepts are not a burden, but a virtue and an opportunity. Academic memes are precisely funny because they deviate from the mundane and overused narrative elements of everyday memes, managing to surprise and delight the audience. This does not mean that every meme referencing mitochondria or Aristotle is automatically funny, though. Quality meme-making takes skill just like any other creative endeavor.

There are also reasons why memes can enrich the learning process, both as a medium of communication, as well as being the locus of communities and social interactions.

Memes as Infographics

Memes can take many forms—images, videos, catch phrases, dance moves, etc., but for the sake of simplicity I will focus on images in this essay.

As a visual medium, memes can be analysed through the lens of design—layout, structure, typography, gestalt, color, imagery, etc. Since memes also have a linguistic component, we can apply linguistic and literary lenses to them too. In combination, and due to their condensed format, memes have a lot of similarities to infographics. In fact, many memes are a creative spin on the idea of a diagram, or quite literally are diagrams. There are a few ways in which the specific visual format and narrative structure of memes are particularly condusive to conveying educational concepts.

Analogy

An analogy is a “a comparison between things that have similar features, often used to help explain a principle or idea”¹. It’s often much easier to explain something by analogy than to actually define it, because you can take advantage of pre-existing knowledge. Many memes engage in comparison, highlighting the similarities of incongruous things for humorous effect.

Dissonance

In fact, it’s often the incongruity and dissonance between the items being highlighted that elicits the chuckles. Some things may seem inherently funny, and others may seem inherently not. But serious things can become amusing when contrasted with more traditionally lighthearted content. This juxtaposition of serious and silly is a common trope in memes, as well as other kinds of humor. Academic or intellectual content fits perfectly in the role of the dissonant counterpart.

Repetition With Variation

Many creative and communicative arts, from music and dance to poetry, design, and even advertisements, employ repetition, rhythm, and variation in order to structure the narrative being conveyed. Jokes do the same thing: repeating a pattern with growing intensity and building on a concept, using rhythm in order to pace a joke and build anticipation. Many meme formats, such as the expanding brain meme or the increasingly verbose meme, illustrate a progression from simplicity to complexity, which is a perfect setup for academic and intellectual content to form the punchline.

Détournement and Culture Jamming

Another concept that is important to educational memes is the practice of Détournement, which is an idea articulated by the Situationist International, a political art movement. To détourn means to hijack or reroute an artifact of mass media by injecting a new narrative². Educational memes engage in this practice by remixing and reinterpreting not only memes and pop culture, but also other artifacts of mass media that are commonly seen in the internet mileau, such as advertisements:

Examples

Here are some more examples of educational memes, see if you can spot any of the techniques previously mentioned:

Educational Memes in Different Spheres

Memes are not only humorous cultural artifacts, but they also play an important role in many aspects of life. They spread information, create community, facilitate interpersonal interactions, and are a form of personal expression. Educational memes and the communities that form around them have many positive impacts on their members, as well as the broader internet. Here are some of those influences:

Public Sphere

• Memes proliferate vocabulary and general knowledge into the public sphere using humor as a vehicle
• Memes reach people who may not know they have an interest in the subject, or that the subject exists/what it really is in the first place (unknown unknowns)
• Memes reach a broad audience with vast and disparate geographic distributions

Communities of Learning & Communities of Memeing

• Educational meme communities bring together learners, hobbyists, professionals, people from different backgrounds & places
• They create a home for very scattered interests
• Educational memes normalize a culture of learning

Social and Interpersonal Interactions

• Members of the community educate each other through humorous engagement and play
• Non-hierarchical learning: everybody benefits from engaging with each other
• Educational meme communities facilitate online “making spaces” for people to explore, share ideas, and also as a touchstone for potential collaborative projects
• The variety and choice of modes of communication allow people to find the most suitable one for their needs and interests

Individual Learners

• Learners get encouragement and motivation, social validation from being in a community, make new friends, and are more likely to stay on a particular learning track
• Creating content for others develops a deeper understanding of the subject as well as teaching various important relevant/general skills and abilities (communication, image editing, research, writing)
• Being in an online learning-oriented community exposes people to potential resources and opportunities that they may not have otherwise found (unknown unknowns)

Models of Mentorship

Educational meme communities thrive because the people inside them have a genuine passion for the subjects they meme about. In these communities, asking the admins to explain the meme, is a meme in itself.

Emotions of Learners

Famous philosophers, scientists, mathematicians, and other historical figures often seem like gods in a faraway land. But all of them were once real human beings that walked this earth and struggled with many of the same things that we do. Academia itself is an impenetrable ivory tower to anyone not privy to it, especially for people who grow up without knowing any academics that could serve as role models for them. Educational memes often highlight not only the ideas of these giants of history, but also anecdotes from their lives, humanizing them.

Seeing a meme about Pythagoras’ strange obsession with beans doesn’t necessarily help to understand the Pythagorean theorem, yet, it creates an emotional connection with Pythagoras the human being—and what does emotion have to do with learning? Everything! Emotions are a critical aspect of cognition and learning, from motivation to memory formation. “Emotions are the shelves upon which the cognitive glassware is placed” and may play a key role in knowledge transfer from learning environments to the real world³.

Conclusion

People are curious. People enjoy learning. People hunger for meaning, complexity and nuance. Students look up to educators when those educators have integrity, self-awareness, and humor. Memes facilitate learning not only as carriers of information, but also as the glue that can hold communities together and motivate the members to find joy and camaraderie in learning. There is much we can learn from the educational meme community.

Works Cited