In mid-May 2020, there was a viral internet meme format that spread in several social media platforms, called “Swole Doge vs Cheems Doge”. That meme is a satire meme that presents a comparison between a big “doge” picture (swole doge) and small “doge” (cheems doge) with texts. This internet meme format first started from a Facebook post by a user called ‘Doges artedanales’. That meme then replicated and articulated many times by netizens on several social media platforms. “Swole Doge vs Cheems Doge” memes are used by netizens as a media to speak about many issues that occurs in daily life, from adolescence issues, family issues, and even politics-economy issues that occurred. As time goes, this internet meme format then evolved until it has many variations that could be used by various community in different countries with various languages, not only in Indonesia. This research’s main goal was to study the “Swole doge vs Cheems doge” meme as a new language form that is globalized in this digital era, and to study this meme format as a part of meme studies that first started by Limor Shifman in 2014. This research studied about form of usages and its transformation, by observing the internet meme elements as said by Limor Shifman; form, content, and stance. Also, this research analyzed about how people use this meme format as a media to speak about various issues. This research will be done with a qualitative-descriptive content analysis based on a structuralism paradigm, so that the output of this research could portray the evolution of the “Swole Doge vs Cheems Doge” meme as a new form of language that could be used by people as a representation of various issues that currently occurs. The output of this research could be used as a reference and as an input for future researchers that will study and analyze deeper about meme studies.
Keywords: internet meme, content, meme structure, global language
Category: Digital Culture & Meme Studies, Social Media