Abstract
This paper is a phenomenological exploration of Indian digital meme cultures through a subjective social media engagement. It is framed a a first person narrative, that takes on a phenomenological approach to follow the experiences of an individual into Instagram and Facebook meme pages. It treats meme cultures as entangled artifacts and attends to their life worlds- how they appear to consciousness in real time, eliciting humor, dread, belonging and disorientation. The immersive narrative exposes how scrolling becomes a rhythmic lived activity within a mediascape, how memes function as emotional atmospheres and humor works as both a shield and a bridge. Influenced by the works of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty, the paper proposes that meme immersion comprises a new modality of being in the media world, fragmented, recursive and real where the self is both represented and constituted through memes
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
Ordinary Practice and Collective Behaviors
KEYWORDS
PHENOMENOLOGY, LIFEWORLDS, MEDIA IMMERSION, MEME
