meme Hear it!

meme Definition

meme (mēm)

noun

a unit of cultural information, as a concept, belief, or practice, that spreads from person to person in a way analogous to the transmission of genes

Etymology: short for mimeme: both coined by R. Dawkins (1941-), Brit biologist ? < mimesis + -eme

meme Usage Examples

Converse of object

  • spread: Someone probably saw this, copied the idea, and so began to spread the meme.
  • start: Perhaps this carnival could start a blogosphere meme instead?
  • do: Don't just google meme, google meme tagging.
  • have: In the meantime, have a musical meme, usual rules.
  • take: Taking the meme 's eye view Why can't we stop thinking?

Preposition: as

  • replicator: Most important, he treated the meme as a replicator in its own right.

Adjective modifier

  • new: Would you be interested in a brand new photo meme?
  • dominant: The grazer tends to get quickly re-infected with the dominant standard meme for the given territory.
  • standard: A deviant mutated standard meme generated from within the territory is easily suppressed due to the already open-minded nature of the grazer.
  • own: I like to think he would be pleased with how his own great meme has evolved.

Modifies a noun

  • trick: Any that happened to have good meme tricks would spread more easily.
  • machine: We humans, alone on this planet, are meme machines.
  • theory: For others, the meme theory promises a more subtle justification of their social position.
  • pool: Memes are not necessarily false beliefs but, in Dawkins view, they fight for survival in the meme pool of ideas.
  • complex: I shall explain how and why memes group together into co-adapted meme complexes, one of which is the self.
  • concept: The meme concept can only obscure this long-term process of enlightenment.

Noun used with modifier

  • book: Book meme I picked this one up from Chris Meme instructions: Look at the list of books below.
  • term: The term meme first appeared in 1976, in Richard Dawkins's best-selling book The Selfish Gene.

Possessives

  • view: Taking the meme's eye view Why can't we stop thinking?

Possessives

  • term: The term ' meme ' was coined by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 bestseller The Selfish Gene.