21 min listen
Meme
FromScience Diction
ratings:
Length:
12 minutes
Released:
Mar 10, 2020
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Remember that summer when the internet was one Distracted Boyfriend after another—that flannel-shirted dude rubbernecking at a passing woman, while his girlfriend glares at him? Everyone had their own take—the Boyfriend was you, staring directly at a solar eclipse, ignoring science. The Boyfriend was youth, seduced by socialism, spurning capitalism. The Boyfriend could be anyone you wanted him to be.
We think of memes as a uniquely internet phenomenon. But the word meme originally had nothing to do with the internet. It came from an evolutionary biologist who noticed that genes weren’t the only thing that spread, mutated, and evolved.
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Guest:
Gretchen McCulloch is an internet linguist. For some fun, check out her book, Because Internet, and her podcast Lingthusiasm. She’s also appeared on Science Friday.
Footnotes And Further Reading:
For an academic take on memes, read Memes in Digital Culture by Limor Shifman.
Read The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.
Check out the first time the word meme appeared in an internet context, in Mike Godwin’s 1994 Wired article called “Meme, Counter-meme.”
Credits:
Science Diction is written and produced by Johanna Mayer, with production and editing help from Elah Feder. Our senior editor is Christopher Intagliata, and we had story editing help from Nathan Tobey. Our theme song and music are by Daniel Peterschmidt. We had fact-checking help from Michelle Harris. Special thanks to the entire Science Friday staff.
We think of memes as a uniquely internet phenomenon. But the word meme originally had nothing to do with the internet. It came from an evolutionary biologist who noticed that genes weren’t the only thing that spread, mutated, and evolved.
Want to stay up to speed with all thing Science Diction? Sign up for our newsletter.
Guest:
Gretchen McCulloch is an internet linguist. For some fun, check out her book, Because Internet, and her podcast Lingthusiasm. She’s also appeared on Science Friday.
Footnotes And Further Reading:
For an academic take on memes, read Memes in Digital Culture by Limor Shifman.
Read The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.
Check out the first time the word meme appeared in an internet context, in Mike Godwin’s 1994 Wired article called “Meme, Counter-meme.”
Credits:
Science Diction is written and produced by Johanna Mayer, with production and editing help from Elah Feder. Our senior editor is Christopher Intagliata, and we had story editing help from Nathan Tobey. Our theme song and music are by Daniel Peterschmidt. We had fact-checking help from Michelle Harris. Special thanks to the entire Science Friday staff.
Released:
Mar 10, 2020
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (43)
Umami: A Century Of Disbelief: Salty, sweet, sour, bitter. Scientists once thought these were the only tastes, but in the early 20th century, a Japanese chemist dissected his favorite kombu broth and discovered one more: umami. In recent years, umami has become a foodie buzzword, but for nearly a century, the Western world was in full-blown umami denial—didn’t believe it existed. And we might have stayed that way if it weren’t for our most notorious and potent source of umami: MSG. A 1930s advertisement for Ajinomoto. (Courtesy of the Science History Institute.) Advertising brochure from the late 1940s until the early 1950s for Ac'cent, an MSG product manufactured by the International Minerals & Chemical Corporation. (Courtesy of the Science History Institute.) Kikunae Ikeda, who proposed the idea of umami as a fifth basic taste. (Wikimedia Commons) Guest: Nirupa Chaudhari is a professor of physiology & biophysics at the University of Miami. Kumiko Ninomiya is the dire by Science Diction