meme

noun

ˈmēm 

1

: an amusing or interesting item (such as a captioned picture or video) or genre of items that is spread widely online especially through social media

… the band encouraged fans to make memes to advertise the U.S. release of their EP …

—William Gruger

The grumpy cat meme frowned its way onto the Internet in September 2012 and never turned its dissatisfied head back. Since then, the image of the cranky cat has grown more and more popular in direct proportion to appearing less and less impressed by fame.

—Anastasia Thrift

2

: an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture

Memes (discrete units of knowledge, gossip, jokes and so on) are to culture what genes are to life. Just as biological evolution is driven by the survival of the fittest genes in the gene pool, cultural evolution may be driven by the most successful memes.

—Richard Dawkins

memetic

mē-ˈme-tik  mə- 

adjective

… the exhibition seeks to give a sense not only of Holmes's origins but of the real-world milieu in which Conan Doyle set him and of his memetic spread through the culture.

—Sam Leith

Did you know?

In his 1976 book The Selfish Gene, British scientist Richard Dawkins defended his newly coined word meme, which he defined as "a unit of cultural transmission." Having first considered, then rejected, mimeme, he wrote: "Mimeme comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like gene." (The suitable Greek root was mim-, meaning "mime" or "mimic." The English suffix -eme indicates a distinctive unit of language structure, as in grapheme, lexeme, and phoneme.) Like any good meme, meme caught on and evolved, eventually developing the meaning known to anyone who spends time online, where it's most often used to refer to any one of those silly captioned photos that the Internet can't seem to get enough of.

Examples of meme in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

This separation keeps parents' Discover Weekly and Wrapped playlists clean from unexpected surprises like a sudden obsession with gaming soundtracks or silly meme songs. —Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 24 Oct. 2025

When asked by Complex Magazine, shortly after the meme was referenced in a South Park episode, Skrilla offered a more personal interpretation. —Diana Leyva, Nashville Tennessean, 24 Oct. 2025

Many people have framed the rise of Red Shambhala as a direct response to Vril and Agartha, two concepts that have become a fixture of alt-right memes in the last year. —Kieran Press-Reynolds, Pitchfork, 24 Oct. 2025

Investors, mindful of the vulnerabilities of an expensive market, with signs of froth forming in more speculative corners such as meme and quantum computing stocks, are rebalancing their portfolios, and adding exposure to defensive sectors that look more attractive after lagging in 2025. —Sarah Min, CNBC, 24 Oct. 2025

Word History

Etymology

alteration of mimeme, from mim- (as in mimesis) + -eme

First Known Use

1976, in the meaning defined at sense 2

Phrases Containing meme

• meme stock

Rhymes for meme

• beam
• bream
• cream
• creme
• deem
• dream
• gleam
• ream
• scheme
• scream
• seam
• seem

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Kids Definition

meme

noun

ˈmēm

: an amusing or interesting item (as a captioned picture or video) or genre of items that is spread widely online especially through social media