The Art of Memes in Feminist Digital Culture (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780814214954)

In The Art of Memes in Feminist Digital Culture, Shana MacDonald argues that memes are a unique medium of communication that both respond to and reflect the current cultural moment. The book--the first to treat memes as a unique medium of communication distinct from other internet and digital media--examines feminist and queer activist uses of memes as a form of digital resistance, demonstrating through collage, reenactment, and montage that countercultural meme makers intervene in the status quo and offer cultural critiques with potentially broad circulation. In this way, MacDonald situates memes as part of a lineage of aesthetic resistance, exploring the operational logic of bricolage, intertextuality, and intermediality within contemporary internet meme cultures on the left. MacDonald examines memes from feminist, queer, antiracist, and anticapitalist accounts on Instagram, as well as how meme genres and themes shift when they travel across different platforms and subcultures. By considering memes as a medium, she sheds light on how they operate within contemporary digital culture as a beacon for online public discourse that pushes against dominant norms.

Author: Shana MacDonald
ISBN-10: 0814214959
ISBN-13: 9780814214954
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Language: English
Published: 08/21/2025
Pages: 216
Format: Hardcover