Meme History 2022: Have You Ever Wondered What The First Meme Is?

Sophie Webster, Tech Times 02 May 2022, 06:05 pm

A Tumblr user may have discovered the first-ever meme in history, and it is from a 1921 cartoon strip.

First Meme Discovered

According to the BBC, the comic strip was posted to Twitter that immediately caused excitement as Twitter users began to wonder if it was the first meme ever published.

this comic strip from 1921 is really relatable to this day pic.twitter.com/DXCpl923Iy
— seepy (@YoRHaw) April 15, 2018

The said meme, which is a format-dependent joke, usually of a picture with a subtitle or caption, had a printed date of 1919 and 1920, but it was believed to have been published in 1921.

The meme had the "Expectations vs. Reality" joke template, which contrasts two pictures side-by-side with an obvious discrepancy between them.

Before it went viral on Twitter, the comic was first posted to Tumblr by user Yesterday's Print. This account shares historical content to highlight the parallels between past and present, according to HighsNobiety.

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The meme was reposted with new captions like "you vs. the guy she tells you not to worry about," referencing another contemporary template meme.

Some Tumblr and Twitter users created their own takes on the format by using other memes like "If you don't love me vs. can't handle me."

Where the First Meme Came From

The comic was found in a 1921 edition of satirical magazine The Judge, and the University of Iowa published it.

Within The Judge, the comic is then credited to a different magazine called the Wisconsin Octopus, published at the University of Wisconsin between 1919 and 1959, according to Thrillist.

By looking through the University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries, they were able to view a few early editions of the Wisconsin Octopus magazine and found that this is not the first time that the "Expectations vs. Reality" format joke appeared in print.

What is a Meme?

The word meme was coined by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene. Dawkins called memes "ideas that spread from brain to brain."

The Oxford English Dictionary defines memes as texts, images, or videos that are copied and spread by internet users, usually with variations.

Also, according to the definition, a single image can't be considered a meme. It has to be copied and spread with variations to the original image.

This means that on its own, 1921 comic is not a meme, but couple with the comic strips from 1919 and 1920, it starts to fit the definition, as the two comics are variations on the same style, using two panels and captions to create an expectation and contrast it with reality.

While no one can't say with certainty that this is the first meme by that definition alone, it can be said that since it was copied and spread with variations, the cartoon was part of a pre-internet "Expectation vs. Reality" meme.

Memes have evolved over the years, from simple comic strips it became screenshots of famous TV shows, movies, and viral videos on the internet, with people creating captions for them to fit their narrative.

Aside from memes, GIFs and short clips are also now being used online as a reaction to certain posts or tweets.

In April 2021, the NFT of Overly Attached GF meme sold for $411,000.

In November 2021, the NFT of Side-Eyeing Chloe meme sold for $74,200.