Metaphoric and metonymic function of a meme

Let us take a closer look at how a meme works on a linguistic and semiotic level.

Key concepts
Here are some theoretical concepts.

Metaphor: the act of comparing two or more objects by substituting or superimposing one over the other.

Metonymy: the act of describing an object by speaking about an associated idea or object or one of its components.

As established, metaphor is associated with the process of condensation in which ideas are conflated or superimposed on one another, either shedding further light on one or more of the conflated ideas or obscuring/repressing some their aspects through this superimposition.

Metonymy is associated with the process of displacement, in which ideas are distorted when the focus is placed on one or more of its components or another associated idea.

How do they function in memes?
Explaining how a meme works would be best done through examples.



You might recognize this as a screencap from Jackson's Fellowship of the Ring in which Boromir says "One does not simply walk into Mordor." With these captions, the meme draws a parallel between the impossible difficulty of listening to Carley Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe" only once and walking into Mordor. The reader of the meme draws upon his or her prior knowledge of popular culture and makes the appropriate connection: the metaphoric comparison and the metonymic displacement of the meme creator's situation onto this moment of the movie. An entire story is told through this simple combination of words and text far more effectively and succinctly than a conventional narrative.

Here's another example.



This image is derived from the internet celebrity 'Grumpy Cat', also known as Tardar Sauce. Most meme users would be familiar with this image, and the cat's expression, along with the allusions that accompany the image, serve to express a state of annoyance and a curmudgeonly demeanor. This is the equivalent of an emoticon, only with an allusory weight derived from the shared experience and knowledge of millions of people.

A third kind of meme relies largely on the a title to deliver its expressive content. For example, here is an image of a lady known as Sweet Brown who became a minor internet celebrity after she gave an interview regarding a housefire. .



Here, a user would title this meme "What I felt when my teacher told me to proofread my essay." The message delivered here should then be pretty self-explanatory and laden with its inherent sarcasm. Note how this supposed student has metaphorically compared proofreading an essay to being tawdry when escaping from a burning house and metonymically displaced his or her situation and opinions to that of Ms. Brown's.