Informational Text: Know Your Meme

This post is by Michael Apfeldorf of the Library of Congress.

Many students will be familiar with memes on social media, but how often do they evaluate the purpose and meaning of a meme? More than 170 memes from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission are freely available in the Library’s online collections. Analyzing these memes can provide students with a way to reflect upon the unique aspects of disseminating informational text in this and other formats.

Begin by showing students this cheese injury meme from the Library’s Informational Text Primary Source Set, or allow them to choose a different meme from the collection. Ask students to examine their meme for several minutes, reflecting on the following questions:

• What was your initial reaction to the meme?
• What details do you observe in both text and graphics?
• What do you think the purpose of the meme is? How effective do you find it to be?
• To what extent did your reaction to the meme change the longer you examined its details?
• What do you wonder about?

Sorting the full list of U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission memes by title allows students to examine another interesting aspect of memes (see the “sort by” drop down list at the top of the page). Once sorted, students may note that many of the memes in the list have been grouped into series. For example, the first 6 memes on the list are all titled: “5 Ways You’ll Make This the Best Snow Day Ever” and offer tips for safety in the event of a blizzard. Challenge students to identify other series in the list. Why do they think these meme series were created?

Students can further reflect on the effectiveness of meme communication by comparing a meme to informational text in another format. The Library’s Informational Text Primary Source Set showcases different types of formats for students to consider, including personal narratives, newspaper articles and ads, instructional videos, speeches, graphs, and maps.

For example, students might compare this playground safety meme to the Handbook for Public Playground Safety, both created by the same organization around the same time. 

Ask students:

• How are the two formats of communication similar and different?
• What does each do well – or not as well?
• Were the two items created for the same – or different — purposes?

Finally, students can use their analysis of memes as a springboard for their own writing projects. Ask students to imagine they are creating two pieces of informational text to communicate with the public. One of these can be a meme. The other should address the same topic, but in a different format. Which additional format do your students choose and why? What unique purpose does each format serve? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? Let us know what your students come up with!

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