Memetics Study On Network Language

The Internet, as one of the most remarkable inventions in the20th century, has exerted uncountable impact on people’s life and led people to a new Internet cultural times. And with the development of Internet and the sharp increasing of netizens, network language as a new special language variant has been born and attracted the attention from different fields. Thus, it is quite necessary to study network language. Although at present more and more scholars both at home and abroad have been studying on network language, their studies mainly focus on the characteristics and classifications of network language, and the influence on traditional language. While for the replication and transmission of network language, there are few studies which have been conducted so far.Nearly at the same time with the birth of Internet, Memetics based on Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, is mainly used to interpret the cultural evolution, which has jumped into the sight of scholars. Since created, Memetics has been widely applied into various fields, like anthroplogy, sociology, psychology, etc. especially linguistics. The study in linguistics is just beginning and few studies have been conducted, but to some extent Memetics can provide a theoretical foundation for relevant studies. As the essence of Memetics, memes are units of cultural transmission, which can be the ideas in the mind, also can be languages, pictures, even facial expressions or gestures. As the most active variant of language, network language has close relationship with meme. There is intense competition among tremendous network language memes, and those memes which survive the hard competition can be widely replicated and transmitted.This study combines network language with the Memetics to explore the levels of network language variation, the dynamic process of network language replication and transmission and the factors affecting the replication and transmission of network language. Meanwhile, by analyzing the pragmatic and rhetorical contribution of network language replication and transmission and the relationship between culture and network language memes, this thesis promotes netizens to take a correct attitude to network language, predicts the developing trend of future network language, and also provides some useful inspiration and reference with the regulation on future language. The author hopes this study can offer a new way of thinking to the study of network language, and thus push the development and applications of Memetics as well.This thesis consists of three parts: introduction, main body and conclusion, whose major concrete contents are as follows:Introduction firstly summarizes the study background of network language and Memetics, and points out the shortcomings. Then, it explains the theoretical significance and the practical values of the network language from the perspective of Memetics and lays out the outline of this thesis.The main body is composed of three chapters.Chapter I is the literature review of the whole thesis which includes some related theories about network language and Memetics. Then, it introduces Memetics to the study of network language, and states the key points and creative points of this study.Chapter II and Chapter III are the main part of this thesis:Chapter II mainly uses Memetics to concretely and systematically analyze the relationship between language and memes, and points out network language, as a variant of language meme, has different variation levels, and also analyze the replication and transmission of network language memes and the affecting factors.Chapter III mainly analyses contributions and significance of network language memes. Firstly, it explores the contributions of network language replication and transmission. Secondly, it analyses the cultural significance of network language memes’ replication and transmission. Based on this, it points out the correct attitude to network language and provides some useful references for the regulation of network language.Conclusion is the last part of this thesis. It mainly points out the findings, the limitations and the significance of this study, and at last the author offers some suggestions for further studies.