Dissertation Proposal and Outline: Partial Project Analysis

Projected dissertation outline:

Part One – Introduction:

• An overview of the research and findings

Part Two – Aim of the research

• Why would the researcher conduct this research

Part Three – Background & Theories: What is ‘Pepe the Frog’

• Explain the background of Pepe the Frog
• Explain the theories that would be used in this research

Part Four – Research methodology

• Explain the research methodology, how it was conducted
• What methods had used in the research and the number of participants

Part Five – Research result: Finding the fact

• Using the result of interview and surveys to discuss about the topic

Part Six – Conclusion

• Summary of arguments and critical overview of research

Part Seven – Appendix

• Bibliography
• The questionnaire and the diagram of result
• The word excerpt of the interviews

Introduction

Proposed dissertation title: 'Why would be people decoded a meme of extremism – 'Pepe the Frog' to an emblem of hope in Hong Kong Protests'.

Aim of research: the aim of this research is wanted to find out why the meme – 'Pepe the Frog' has changed the original image from the hate symbol, a cheerleader of racism and anti-Semitism to become a pro-democracy freedom fighter in the Hong Kong protests, a symbol that representing hope.

This research would not discuss about the politics issue which happening in the Hong Kong Protests. It would just focus on how the meme ‘Pepe the Frog’ become popular in the Protests. As the creator Matt Furie said that, the comic that Pepe the Frog appear didn't have any politics position, while it became popular, many people using it as a meme to represent their feeling or opinions. Although the original meaning may not have any politics factor, the meaning of these meme of Pepe has been changed to a hate symbol, a symbol of the alt-right movement. People might think that ‘Pepe the Frog’ is a racial supporter of racism and anti-Semitic, seem that the Pepe is generally considered to be malicious in the world, indicating an evil and dangerous worldview. However, at the same time, Pepe the Frog also representing freedom and supporting democracy in the Hong KongProtests. This research is aim to find out why the meme ‘Pepe the Frog’ will become a hope symbol instead of the previous meaning of hate symbol in the Hong Kong Protests and compare the impression of ‘Pepe the Frog’ before and after the arise of Hong Kong Protests towards Hong Kong people.

Outline of topic and research question: the 'Pepe the Frog' is an internet meme which is came from a comic called Boy's Club which is created by an American artist and cartoonist Matt Furie, Pepe is one of the character of that comic. Pepe seem to have a coarse image, therefore it cannot be appearing in the comic when the comic was published, but some people has scanned and uploaded the page containing Pepe and the catchphrase to the internet, and make it become meme. The meme of Pepe took off among internet, and some people adapted Pepe's face and catchphrase to fit different scenarios and emotions, also added different color and cloths. After that, some of the celebrities like Katy Perry or Nicki Minaj has shared the meme of Pepe on social media and Pepe started to become popular.

However, the meme of Pepe has started to become a hate symbol in the 2016 United States presidential election because of the meme of Pepe was connected to Donald Trump's campaign. In October 2015, Trump retweeted a Pepe representation of himself, associated with a video called 'You Can't Stump the Trump'. After Donald Trump started to use the meme of Pepe to ask voters for support, various news organizations also reported associations of the character with white nationalism and the alt-right during the election. For example, in May 2016, Olivia Nuzzi of The Daily Beast wrote that there was 'an actual campaign to reclaim Pepe from normies' and that 'turning Pepe into a white nationalist icon' was an explicit goal of some on the alt-right. Moreover, an article published on Hillary Clinton's campaign website described Pepe as 'a symbol associated with white supremacy' and denounced Trump's campaign for its supposed promotion of the meme. The Anti-Defamation League, an American organization opposed to antisemitism, included Pepe in its hate symbol database but wrote that most instances of Pepe were not used in a hate-related context. These things make the image of Pepe become negative and the creators Matt Furie cannot control it, and at the end Furie had killed Pepe off in response to the character's continued use as a hate symbol. In 2019, Hong Kong protestors began to use the depictions of Pepe the Frog as a symbol of liberty and resistance against the extradition bill and police brutality in the 2019 Hong Kong anti-extradition bill protests. New images of Pepe the Frog surfaced showing Pepe with an injured eye after a young female first aider got her eye gouged by a projectile thrown by police and spurred a new protest campaign called 'An eye for an eye'. A sign with Pepe with an injured eye holding by a young nurse with her one eye covered gained international media attention. That become the last straw making the meme of Pepe become extensively used in the Hong Kong Protest. Many different memes become widely used which is Pepe wearing black t-shirt, yellow helmet and a mask and that is the gear Hong Kong protestors usually wear, with some slogan support the Protest. That make Pepe the Frog become a symbol of Hong Kong Protests with representing hope, freedom, liberty and resistance. Stuart Hall has suggested that the theory of coding and decoding which are related to this research, he explain that the media messages are produced, disseminated, and interpreted by different people using the form of coding and encoding. Coding is the production of the message, the sender will create a sign and spread it out, it aimed to let more people understand the information that the sender want other people know. It is very important how a message will be encoded, it will affect the meaning of the message. It is because the process of interpretation and translation to the coded information is based on the knowledge of the audience. While people using the intended way to decode the message, it would become an effective communication; However, it is still possible for the message recipient to understand a message in a completely different way. This is due to the 'distortions' or 'misunderstanding' arise from lack of equivalence between the two sides in communicative exchange. In this research, the meme of 'Pepe the Frog' are having different meaning to different people, it would be related to the difference of decoding. Meme is a transformative sign, which have diverse meaning, some are readerly, which already having a certain meaning; some are writerly, which is created the meaning by the audience. Sometimes the meme may not be representing that thing, but the people would be understanding the message by their knowledge and changing the original meaning. For example, some people may not know about Pepe before the Hong Kong Protest, but after the Protest, they will explain that the meme of Pepe must be related to Hong Kong Protest, although that may not.

Furthermore, this topic may also be related to media surveillance and sousveillance. As the government may be having surveillance on different social media platform, that make people cannot express their opinions by some explicit language, so they would use meme to express their opinions, they can argue about the meaning as different people will have different explain, so they can express their views under the surveillance of government. For the Hong Kong protest, many people used the meme of Pepe to express their opinion, in this research we may also discuss about this.

Research method and approach: as this research will be mainly focus on the Hong Kong Protests, most of the interviewers and participant would be Hong Kong people, or perhaps including some of the people come from other country which may have other different opinions, to make a compare of the impression of 'Pepe the Frog' and Hong Kong Protests. Therefore, the sampling will be using snowball sampling, which would be asking the research participants recruit other participants who suitable to join in the research. It is because this research is mainly focus on the Hong Kong Protests, some of the people may not have a knowledge of it, therefore we cannot use random sampling in this research. This research would be using interviews and surveys to collect the data from the participants. The target quantity of surveys would be 50-60 because surveys need certain number to find out the opinions of majority, but this research would be focus more on the interview, therefore 50-60 would be the suit number. Surveys are help to collect the general opinions from the participants, as not many people would able to do the interviews, surveys would not take a long time to finish and it can easily collect from the internet. In this research, some people may not want to show out their identity, therefore surveys would be an effective method to collect their data as they can hide their identity.

Moreover, although surveys could be collect a greater quantity of data, but it cannot some fuller, more in-depth responses, therefore this research would also use another method which is interviews. The target quantity of interviews would be 6-8 people, most interviewees would be Hong Kong people, and maybe a few people from china or other country. It is because Hong Kong people would have a direct feeling and they would be the frequently user of the Pepe memes. However, only collecting the data from Hong Kong people maybe too unilateral, therefore we would also invite some people from other country which can collect more comprehensive data.

Ethical Issues & Issues of Self-Reflexivity

This research would discuss about the Hong Kong Protest, that may be related to some politics issues, which some people may think the protest would have some moral problem, for example arson or scuffle. Moreover, as the meme of Pepe are come from a slapstick comedy, the slogan or pose may be vulgar or including some rough language. Therefore, this research would not be suitable for children to take part in. Participants would have a right to withdraw, these ethical issues will be made clear to participants before they start the interviews or surveys, they can be withdrawing anytime if they feel indisposed.

All participants will be required the answer an agreement before the start of the interviews or surveys, which they have to consent that these information collected in the interviews or surveys are allowed to discuss in this research, also we would promise the secrecy of the research which the research would not divulge the identity information of the participants, and all information would only be used on the research, these record and questionnaire would be destroy after the research.

Issues of self-reflexivity. As the researcher are also Hong Kong people, that may have the personal politics opinions or views, therefore need to care about the personal opinions would not be hampering the research, it may helpful for the research because the researcher is already having basic knowledge of the protest, the researcher is required to be vigilant to ensure that personal opinion does not override academic research, unless there is sufficient data to support that opinion.

Bibliography

• Aunger, R. (2013). The electric meme: a new theory of how we think and communicate. New York: Simon & Schuster. (This book is discussing about meme, which may answer the question of why people will use meme and the history of meme, therefore it may be helpful for this research).
• Bakir, V. (2010). Sousveillance, Media and Strategic Political Communication: Iraq, USA,
• UK. (1st ed.). New York: Bloomsbury Academic & Professional. (This book is talking about the sousveillance in media, that maybe one of the reason making people using meme, therefore it may helpful for finding out why people will using the meme of Pepe).
• Blackmore, S. (2000). The meme machine. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (This book is talking about meme, which have a brief introduction of meme, and it is helpful for this research to define meme and discuss about it).
• De Vaus, D. (2014). Surveys in social research (Sixth ed., Social research today (Routledge (Firm))). London; New York: Routledge. (This book is talking about why we should use surveys to collect data and how to design a questionnaire, as this research would be using surveys as one of the research method, it would be helpful for this research).
• Hall, S. (1980). Culture, media, language: Working papers in cultural studies, 1972-79. London : [Birmingham, West Midlands]: Hutchinson ; Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, University of Birmingham. (This book has discussed about the theory of coding and decoding, which the meme is one type of coding message, therefore it would be helpful for discuss about meme).
• Hollway, W., & Jefferson, Tony. (2000). Doing qualitative research differently free association, narrative and the interview method. London; Thousand Oaks, Calif.: SAGE. (This book has talked about the usefulness and importance of the interview, and teach people how to do a better interview, so this is helpful for this research as this research would be using surveys as one of the research method).
• Kek, Cucks, and God Emperor Trump: A Measurement Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web (This is a research about how Donald Trump using social media to improve his position. Donald Trump has used Pepe the frog when he is having the election, and this research also discussed about this, therefore it would be helpful for this research as it is one of the reason that people think Pepe the frog as a hate symbol and this research would be discussing about it).
• Leistert, O. (2013). From protest to surveillance: The political rationality of mobile media: Modalities of neoliberalism. Frankfurt am Main, [Germany]: PL Academic Research. (This book is discussing about the surveillance of protest, that may be related to this research because the memes of Pepe are appeared in the Hong Kong protest, it may helpful to find out the reason that make people using meme of the pepe in the protest).
• Tanaka, Y., & John Wiley & Sons. (2003). Meme media and meme market architectures knowledge media for editing, distributing, and managing intellectual resources. Piscataway, NJ: Hoboken, NJ: IEEE Press; Wiley-Interscience. (This book had discussed the meme in media, it maybe a little bit outdated because it is punished but it may be helpful to discuss about meme).
• BBC News. (2019). Pepe the Frog branded a 'hate symbol'. [online] Available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-37493165 [Accessed 16 Nov. 2019].
• Collins, S. (2015). The Creator of Pepe the Frog Talks About Making Comics in the Post- Meme World. [online] Vice. Available at: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/avy3aj/feels-good-man-728 [Accessed 16 Nov.2019].
• Echevarria, G. (2019). Extremists turned a frog meme into a hate symbol, but Hong Kong protesters revived it as an emblem of hope. [online] Business Insider. Available at: https://www.businessinsider.com/pepe-frog-meme-hate-symbol-hope-hong-kong-protesters-2019-10?r=US&IR=T [Accessed 16 Nov. 2019].
• Frank, P. (2019). The Strange Internet Journey of Pepe The 'Chilled-Out Stoner Frog'. [online] Huffpost.com. Available at: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/matt-furie-pepe-frog-meme_us_57ed3a6fe4b0c2407cdc4298?ri18n=true [Accessed 15 Nov. 2019].
• Haskell, W. (2015). This guy created the frog meme that's all over the internet — here’s why he’s ‘kinda pissed off'. [online] Business Insider. Available at: https://www.businessinsider.com/this-guy-created-one-of-the-most-famous-memes-heres-why-hes-kinda-pissed-off-2015-7?r=US&IR=T [Accessed 16 Nov. 2019].
• Katzowitz, J. and Jaworski, M. (2015). The story behind 4chan's Pepe the Frog meme. [online] The Daily Dot. Available at: https://www.dailydot.com/unclick/4chan-pepe-the-frog-renaissance/ [Accessed 16 Nov. 2019].
• Nast, C. (2019). Pepe the Frog Means Something Different in Hong Kong—Right?. [online] Wired. Available at: https://www.wired.com/story/pepe-the-frog-meme-hong-kong/# [Accessed 16 Nov. 2019].