From political commentary to semiotic play: Humour and the Královec/Kaliningrad meme
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| Year of publication | 2023 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | The presentation documents a case study of politically oriented humour that emerged in the Czech Republic as a reaction to the staged referendums in several regions of Ukraine in September 2022 - the fake annexation of Kaliningrad. The presentation shows how that witty one-off reaction was taken up in the digital sphere by a number of users as a form of playful grassroots digital activism – a collective act of online political humour aimed to deconstruct the triggering event, and to criticize and delegitimize other countries’ claims to various territories. The data collected from the Czech internet over several months show the gradual trajectory of what I call the “Královec meme” from such an initial humorous commentary towards a fully memetic element. |
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