Pop Culture and Memes
While I was not in class Tuesday (4/4), the topic of pop culture treatment of the Digital Age is really interesting. I found myself agreeing with the articles that mentioned that pop culture is dying or becoming less prevalent. A clear example I have of this phenomenon is when it comes to popular songs on the radio. For instance, I remember my family and I would try and predict the “Song of the Summer” based on what was popular on the radio. However, with the growth of streaming platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music, etc. people are able to listen to music specifically catered to their music tastes and not what is being promoted on the radio. Due to this, my family and I have noticed throughout the years this lack of a “Song of the Summer.” Additionally, with TV/movie streaming platforms, we are starting to see fewer shows become culturally significant for long periods of time. For instance, we no longer have long-standing popular shows such as Grey’s Anatomy, Supernatural, and Doctor Who. Now we have shows that blow up on social media for maybe a month or two at most before fading into oblivion, as seen with the new Netflix show Wednesday. I love how the trailer for Black Mirror season three was added to the material to watch. I love the show and I think episodes in season 3, particularly “Nosedive,” show how impactful social media can be, especially when it comes to trending content influencing our day-to-day lives.
As for Thursday’s class (4/6), I enjoyed our conversation about memes. I think it was good to have this discussion after our meme misinformation project since we were able to discuss what we have already applied to our work. Memes are so influential today, and their impact on advertising and activism is so prevalent when on social media. In regard to the class discussion, I thought the question posed about whether or not memes are similar to classic literature was very intriguing. My thoughts were ultimately that memes are so quick to fade in and out and lose their relevancy that I do not think they are similar to classic literature in the sense that those books carry on a legacy. While some memes do remain around for while, as new memes appear and younger generations get familiar with those rather than the ones we grew up with, even older memes we remember so clearly will probably fade eventually.
