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#OkBoomer, Time to Meet the Zoomers’: Studying the Memefication of Intergenerational Politics on TikTok.

By Jing Zeng and Crystal Abidin

How has the migration of political spaces online to social media impacted how older generations interact with social media?

The Authors

Dr. Jing Zeng

Dr. Jing Zeng

  • Senior researcher and teaching associate at the University of Zurich
  • Digital methods
  • Online platforms
  • Online misinformation
  • Science communication

  • Co-founder of TikTok Cultures Research Network

Dr. Crystal Abidin

Dr. Crystal Abidin

  • Founder of the TikTok Cultures Research Network
  • Anthropologist and ethnographer of internet cultures
  • Influencer cultures
  • Internet celebrities
  • Social media pop cultures,
  • Works mostly in the Asia-Pacific region

Coming to Terms with

CTT

#OkBoomer, Time to Meet the Zoomers’: Studying the Memefication of Intergenerational Politics on TikTok.”

The Author's Purpose

The purpose of this article is to investigate the key controversial issues discussed on TikTok by content created to align with the “Ok Boomer” meme format. Gen Z uses TikToks as an expression of their political culture and this paper explores how this application enforces the generational divide between Gen Z and Boomers.

Purpose

Audience

  • Published in Information, Communication & Society
  • explores the development and application of information and communications technologies
  • Written for fellow academics in communications research

Audience

Moves

  • Introductory:

lyrics from "Ok Boomer," a TikTok song by @james.bee

  • Using charts and raw data:

Moves

"Boomer"

"Being a Boomer is

not an age-specific phenomenon but rather a mindset."

Key Terms

"Circumscribed Creativities"

Key Terms

The platform in which content exists on can afford or restrain the creative potentials of the content.

"Meme Form"

The content style by which memes are conveyed through each video, shaped by TikTok's technological features.

Quotes

"We take a sociological approach to understanding ‘generations’ as a symbolic and dynamic, rather than a biological and static, existence. As a form of social identity, a ‘generation’ comes into being through collective identification or through creating the ‘generational we-sense.'" (2461)

Quotes

"‘Boomer vibes are detected when people appear to be patronising or express conservative viewpoints on socio-political issues. In other words, being a Boomer is not an age-specific phenomenon but rather a mindset." (2473)

The Plan

Who am I trying to reach?

The Plan

  • people who inhabit social media spaces
  • primarily Gen Z
  • helping Gen Z understand the impact of what they post on older generations

Forwarding

Forwarding

  • Does a similar space exist on social media where boomers create content for each other to consume and perpetuate conservative ideas?

  • Is it Gen Z’s fault in that driving away older folks from progressive spaces, perpetuates the cycle of boomers being removed from spaces where they could learn progressiveness?

Questions:

Have you ever personally made a meme with the intent to target someone of an older generation?

Citation

Do you think younger generations welcoming older ones would heal some of the divide both socially and politically between generations?

Citation

Zeng, Jing, and Crystal Abidin. “‘#OkBoomer, Time to Meet the Zoomers’: Studying the Memefication of Intergenerational Politics on TikTok.” Information, Communication & Society, vol. 24, no. 16, Dec. 2021, pp. 2459–81. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2021.1961007.

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