In the 16th
century, people’s knowledge was based where they lived and the circumstances of
their home town. They usually did not go any further than 5 kilometres from
there (Herman) . The invention of
print meant an incredible change in the way people communicate and how
information spread. An example of this new form of communication is Luther with
his 95 theses.
Luther’s 95 theses
were a protest against the corruption of the Catholic church. He put his theses
on a piece of paper and nailed it to the doors of a church. The word spread
around about what he did and with the invention of the printing press, it was
easier and cheaper than ever to spread the theses around on pamphlets. The use
of the printing press also got many more agents involved in the process: people
who printed the pamphlets, delivered them and of course the people who read and
shared them because they shared
Luther’s opinion on the case. As a result, Luther’s theses spread among
thousands of people. It was seen as the origin of the reformation and Protestantism.
Luther managed to
spread his message among a huge amount of people, an impressive thing to do
without today’s social media platforms. Twitter, Facebook and other media forms
make it even more easy to spread content, by for example retweeting and sharing on Facebook. Take Pepe the Frog,
for example. He started out fairly innocent, but is now a well-known hate
symbol. This started out by Trump jr. posting a photoshopped movie poster on Instagram
with many prominent conservatives and Pepe the Frog (Zed) . This post even made
it to the news. After that, the meme got much attention because there were many
people against Trump. The message was a protest against Donald Trump and his
ideals. This was framed by the digital media in the form of a meme named Pepe
the Frog. There are some similar agents with Luther: people who read/see it and
share it. A different agent in the context of Pepe is the people who modified the meme.
Works cited
Herman, A. (2016, November 1).
CS371. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University.
Zed, T. (2015). Pepe the Frog.
Retrieved November 14, 2016, from Know Your Meme:
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pepe-the-frog
Carolien,
ReplyDeleteI enjoy how you emphasized the act of sharing between the two examples. It seems that you have connected it to the third articulation of media assemblage, mainly the circulation and distribution of the content. However, apart from sharing I think that recontextualization and reappropriation is also another important aspect to consider, just as you briefly did at the end of your post. Because Pepe the Frog originally started out as an innocent character as you said, the constant recontextualization into Trump memes encouraged his character to be associated with new meanings, which then got shared again. I think that it's the relationship between recontextualization and sharing that ultimately gets the message across.