A Pragmatic Study Of Network-buzzword Memes

A meme is a unit of information and the gene of culture(Dawkins,1976).As a crucial carrier of cultural inheritance,language is a powerful tool for memes' dissemination.Memes that evolve through language imitation are known as language memes.The rapid development of network technology and promotion of related social platforms have spawned various network expressions.Some expressions are favored by the public for their fashionability,humor and catchiness.Having been widely imitated,replicated and disseminated,these expressions evolve into network-buzzword memes.Featured as popularity,catchiness,and prolificacy,network-buzzword memes are a species of constantly updated variant of language memes,which are mainly grounded upon the aligned co-effects of self-advantages,host' subjective initiative and outer contexts.Embodying a strong sense of the times and distinctive social characteristics,these memes fulfill various functions and effects.The current study attempts to explore the pragmatic attributes of network-buzzword memes.Hence,this study is dedicated to hopefully address two key purposes: First,the triggering mechanism and classifications of network-buzzword memes;Second,the interpersonal pragmatic functions in communication and pragmatic effects on language ecology realized during the replication of these memes.A small corpus is established by collecting network-buzzword memes from 2007 to 2018 and their application examples in communication.On the basis of relevant memetic,interpersonal pragmatic and alignment theories,this study constructs an analytical framework for this research.A corpus-driven qualitative method assisted by literature retrieval and exemplification is employed to analyze these memes.Alignment runs through the three stages of network-buzzword memes' life cycle,namely,triggering,decoding and encoding and transmission stage.In view of the triggering of these memes,this study uncovers that the aligned co-effects of the meme's advantages,host subjective factors and outer contexts contribute to memes' triggering.Among them,memes' advantages include their forms,contents and styles,while the subjective factors involve host's physiological and psychological conditions.And outer contexts comprise media platforms,celebrity effects and social inclusiveness.The triggered memes can be divided into multiple types.According to the strength and mode of transmission,genotype,phenotype,mutant type strong and weak memes are reached.And in terms of representational form and evaluation,they embrace word,sentence,emoji,positive and negative memes.By analyzing the pragmatic attributes of network-buzzword memes,this study finds that pragmatic alignment lies in the last two stages of memes' life cycle and it serves as the foundation for the fulfillment of interpersonal pragmatic functions and pragmatic effects.Alignment of hosts' cognition promotes the realization of interpersonal pragmatic functions which mainly comprise least effort maintenance,imitative recreation,emotional expression and interpersonal harmony promotion.In addition,the dissemination of memes and alignment among hosts,memes and language ecology are the basis for the realization of pragmatic effects.These effects exerted on language ecology cover positive and negative sides.Positive effects highlight the promotion of language diversity and dynamism.Whereas the negative counterparts reveal impacts on language norms and language pollution.The present study initiates a pragmatic inquiry of network-buzzword memes and incorporates memetic research into the category of pragmatics,enriching the research scope of network buzzwords.The exploration of interpersonal pragmatic functions of network-buzzword memes is constructive for the proper use of these memes in communication and the maintenance of interpersonal harmony.Nonetheless,how to better align memes,hosts and language ecology requires further investigation.Enough attention should be paid to the dissemination of negative network-buzzword memes.Language users are obliged to resist and eliminate the negative language memes to facilitate the construction of language ecological civilization.