meme
Americannoun
verb (used without object)
verb (used with object)
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of meme
First recorded in 1976; coined by British evolutionary biologist C. Richard Dawkins (born 1941), shortening of Dawkins's original creation mimeme, which was based on Greek mī́mēma “imitation, copy; artistic representation,” but which Dawkins also wanted to look and sound like gene; cf. mimesis ( def. )
Explanation
A meme is an idea or habit that's passed between people and generations through imitation. An example of a meme is the cultural tradition of women wearing skirts. A cultural idea, value, habit, or even something like a tune is a meme if it is picked up from someone else. A meme, which is pronounced "meem," will change over time, like younger kids who want to wear the exact same clothes but who eventually develop their own, though similar, styles. Recently, meme has become commonly used to refer to Internet memes — pictures, videos, or even slang words that are shared between Internet users.
Vocabulary lists containing meme
The Hate U Give
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The Poet X
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This Week in Pop Culture: December 8 -14, 2018
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
It bothered Lacy, a serious artist who wrote with Kendrick Lamar and earned a Grammy nomination as a teenager in the R&B collective The Internet, suddenly thrust into living meme territory with “Bad Habit.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 22, 2026
We might also consider completely removing the term ultra because it is weirdly emotional and sounds more like a meme than science.
From Slate ● Jul. 12, 2026
But “Backrooms” was based on an internet meme and “Obsession” is an original film from a director who became famous online.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 10, 2026
Although Canadian software company BlackBerry was once considered “a meme stock,” he said.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 9, 2026
The same meme makes the rounds every storm: “Tornado season PSA: Bras on, teeth in!”
From "Legendary Frybread Drive-In" by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Poop jokes and memes aside, cyclosporiasis is a serious parasitic foodborne intestinal illness whose symptoms include nausea, fatigue, and explosive diarrhea that can last weeks or even months without antibiotic treatment.
From Slate ● Jul. 22, 2026
In the meantime, the tower's 400,000-euro outdoor LED screen has been turned off for months after online memes re-imagined it as the baleful eye of Sauron's fortress of Barad-dur from "The Lord of the Rings".
From Barron's ● Jul. 17, 2026
And within 30 minutes, you had memes and people talking about the Elf and pretending they cared about the Elf.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 14, 2026
Photographs and memes of the skyscraper, which are unrelated to Friday's incident, have also been removed from Chinese social media platforms.
From BBC ● Jun. 30, 2026
Boaz thought of the memes he’d seen claiming that some actor was actually a time traveler, their doppelgänger found in a vintage photograph.
From "Night Owls" by A.R. Vishny
“Time to meme like we have never memed before,” wrote Reddit user chance901.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 24, 2026
One of America’s most famous martial artists, and certainly the most frequently memed, Norris leveraged his black belt skills to build a successful television and film career.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 20, 2026
After Grimes and Musk split, he memed his way into being forced to buy Twitter for way too much money.
From Salon ● Nov. 7, 2025
By his own admission, it was a bold move, one that turned him into one of the most famously memed figures in India.
From BBC ● Aug. 2, 2025
That said, it’s always a gamble for a memed figure to lean into their own joke; it can kill the momentum.
From Slate ● Jul. 23, 2024
As for the spoofing and memeing of the 60-second spot, Trotter said she and her colleagues just “can’t ignore it.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 30, 2025
Rachel Greenspan, writer and social strategist, joins us once again to argue for discretion in memeing.
From Slate ● Jan. 16, 2024
We said, 'No.' They didn't think of the impact that would have on how people would pick that up and start memeing it, and that's what happens with these things.
From BBC ● Sep. 27, 2022
The deal also includes Morbius, a film that flopped at the box office and was brought back to theaters by relentless memeing only to flop again.
From The Verge ● Jun. 17, 2022
“We might of been mistakenly memeing him in. Those empty eyes, the yesterdays victory speech,” one user posted.
From The Guardian ● Nov. 15, 2016
And when watching the series, there is no question about the skill of the team members, so I was initially a little shocked at the eventual meming of the show.
From Salon ● Feb. 4, 2020
On the left, we spend our time calling out and shutting down, lolling and meming and dropping mics.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 1, 2017
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
