Comments on: Engaging & Dispatching Memetics

By: On Reaching a Broader Public: Five Ideas for Anthropologists « Neuroanthropology

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:29:33 +0000

[...] Thomas Hylland Eriksen in his book Engaging Anthropology: The Case for a Public Presence looks at why meme theory is popular and then challenges anthropologists to develop something better. Similarly, Frederick Barth, as part of an overall examination of public anthropology, points us [...]

By: Richard Dawkins on ‘Elders’ « Neuroanthropology

Richard Dawkins on ‘Elders’ « Neuroanthropology — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 11:09:23 +0000

[...] egregious abuses of his neologism by other theorists (on ‘memes’ you can read more here and here). But even other evolutionary theorists typically find this theoretical reach hard to [...]

By: larvalsubjects

larvalsubjects — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 04:52:31 +0000

As someone who comes from an ethnography and cultural studies background, I think the criticism that memes fail to draw on these traditions hits the mark. One could go one step further and speak of the manner in which memetics ignores all of the work that’s been done in semiotics broadly construed. Nonetheless, I think that the concept of memes hits on something important and often overlooked in emphasizing the notion of signs as replicators that are situated in time and space that get selected for. It seems to me that cultural theorists would be more effective not in rejecting this concept, but in complicating it nicely with their own tools and background.

By: Meme vaccine « Dead Voles

Meme vaccine « Dead Voles — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:27:32 +0000

[...] this is a topic that interests you, please go and also read Daniel’s post Engaging & Dispatching Memetics, which reviews and links Thomas Hylland Eriksen’s discussion of the topic in his book [...]

By: John Postill

John Postill — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:09:14 +0000

PS see also this research about how certain ‘infectious’ people spread digital contents (or ‘memes’ in the unfortunate wording chosen) on the internet:

http://johnpostill.wordpress.com/2009/08/16/httpwp-mep1dnd-bv/

By: John Postill

John Postill — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:01:58 +0000

Great post, daniel. I think Eriksen is spot on when he says that “those of us [anthropologists] who feel that memetics is insufficient have to come up with a better alternative than merely stating that things are more complicated than this. Saying ‘things are more complicated’ is like having endless meetings to avoid making a controversial decision”.

This reminds me that I owe neuroanthropology a reference (see Why We Hate Memes thread), namely a review I wrote some time ago of Robert Aunger’s book on memes. Here it is:

http://johnpostill.co.uk/reviews/review_aunger.htm

I’ve got a book to finish (writing, not reading) by 28 Aug. Will post on memetics and its alternatives sometime in Sep!!