You in all probability didn’t understand what number of phrases start with the prefix “pan-” till we discovered ourselves dwelling by a pan … demic. On social media, we’re in a “panorama,” a “pandemonium,” a “pandemi moore,” a “panini.”
Over the previous yr, a brand new lexicon has emerged on-line: “quarantinis” to explain at-home cocktails in quarantine; “stimmy” for stimulus checks; “doomscrolling” on your incapability to go offline. These humorous phrases make intimidatingly scientific and medical jargon extra accessible, and shorter variations of phrases typically grow to be helpful as a result of they’re simply and rapidly verbalized. Most of all, humor can be an important tool for processing these attempting occasions. (A 15-year follow-up examine of 53,556 members from Norway discovered that having a humorousness can also be related to dwelling longer.)
“We’re manipulating the structure of the word,” mentioned Adrienne R. Washington, a professor of sociocultural linguistics at Norfolk State University in Virginia. “We’re dropping syllables, like with ‘Rona,’ or sometimes we make them into diminutives, which are words that are more familiar or maybe even endearing.”
Dr. Washington famous: “A diminutive makes something less grave than the original terms.”
There’s additionally taking it to the extent of artwork. Hunter Harris, a contract author, has pioneered, on social media and in Hung Up, her publication, the “pandemi cup bra,” “Jonathan panDemme” and “pandeuxmoi.”
“You just have to kind of retreat into the most blasé or playful language because the actual tragedy of it is too much,” she mentioned. “It’s also just like a funny brain puzzle to think about what words can mutate into becoming pandemic.”
There is a formulation for writing a tweet that will get most retweet worth. Sometimes, the profitable formulation might be piling onto no matter humorous meme format is circulating that week. That creates a collaborative facet of virality — which means that this linguistic joke can’t be credited to anyone individual. It’s everybody’s creation.
A big a part of this meme’s success is owed to Black Twitter, which Dr. Washington described as “a virtual community” but in addition a linguistic one, marked, partially, by “collaborative journalism.” Much like African-American Vernacular English, or “Black speech,” permits Black Americans to tell apart themselves from their counterparts by using culturally particular phrases and references, Black Twitter “often gives us the language to make sense of different realities,” Dr. Washington mentioned.
For Black Americans, a few of these completely different realities can be traumatic and even fatal. Levity is often used as a approach to reduce the burden of occasions that really feel too heavy to carry.
One use of Black Twitter has grow to be a chance for Black Americans to take part in a public, collective grieving course of in real-time. Its cultural relevance has influenced the energetic participation of others, one joke constructing off the earlier, making this specific model of linguistic meme well-liked throughout extra communities on-line.
“It’s something that we all have in common,” mentioned Ms. Harris. “And the internet, and Twitter specifically, is mostly a place to talk about things in a lighthearted, clever, funny way — or at least those are the jokes that perform the best.”
Ms. Harris tried to make use of “panopticon” in dialog, and it didn’t play out as properly in individual, which confirmed that not calling the pandemic by its title is “a very online thing to do.”
When Ayana Lage, a full-time advertising and marketing freelancer in Tampa, Fla., first got here throughout pandemic-renaming on Twitter, it was in response to a gaggle {photograph} taken on trip that wasn’t following journey or social distancing protocol.
“Someone said: ‘In a panorama?’ And it stopped me in my tracks. Then the replies were people riffing off of each other,” Ms. Lage mentioned. “At one point — a low point — I did Google ‘words that start with P’ because I wanted to up my arsenal,” she added, and laughed.
As the pandemic continues, so do the nicknames — attempt “Panic at the Disco.” According to Ms. Lage, addressing the burden of the coronavirus’ impression on society in a humorous manner “feels natural” and “feeds into the absurdity of it all and the weird times that we’re facing.”
“New meme formats often die very quickly,” mentioned Ms. Lage. “So for something to last more than a month is definitely not the norm.”
