Let me start by explaining what memetics is and where it comes from. Memetics is one possible way of using Darwinian evolutionary ideas to study culture. As I shall explain below, it is not the only way of doing this. According to memetics, the essence of culture is constituted by memes and the essence of cultural change is constituted by changes in meme frequencies. Memes are mental states that embody discrete chunks of socially transmissible information. To say that the information that memes embody is socially transmissible is to say that memes can give rise to other memes through social learning. To say that memes embody a discrete chunk of information is to say that, when the information present in a meme is socially transmitted, such information does not usually blend with the information present in other memes. On this view, social transmission is (at least at its most fundamental level) a copying process in which memes generate copies of themselves. Memes are thought to be socially transmissible beliefs, desires, values, and mental representations of tunes, stories, myths, rituals, ways of doing (or saying, or thinking about) things, etc. According to some versions of memetics, it is not just socially transmissible mental states that deserve to be classified as memes, but also those artefacts and activities (including those of a linguistic and textual nature) that can be copied and that can result in the existence of similar artefacts or activities.

These days meme is evolving semantically again, which seems like an appropriately meme-y thing to do. We've spotted it functioning as a verb: Moritz, Elan (1995). Heylighen, F.; Joslyn, C.; Turchin, V. (eds.). "Metasystems, Memes and Cybernetic Immortality". World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution. New York: Gordon and Breach Science Publishers. 45 (Specia Issue: The Quantum of Evolution: Toward a Theory of Metasystem Transitions): 155–171. doi: 10.1080/02604027.1995.9972558. Petrova, Yulia (2021). "Meme language, its impact on digital culture and collective thinking". E3S Web of Conferences. 273: 11026. Bibcode: 2021E3SWC.27311026P. doi: 10.1051/e3sconf/202127311026. ISSN 2267-1242. S2CID 237986424. a b c Dawkins 1989, p. 192 "We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation. 'Mimeme' comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like 'gene'. I hope my classicist friends will forgive me if I abbreviate mimeme to meme. If it is any consolation, it could alternatively be thought of as being related to 'memory', or to the French word même. It should be pronounced to rhyme with 'cream'." A field of study called memetics [10] arose in the 1990s to explore the concepts and transmission of memes in terms of an evolutionary model. Criticism from a variety of fronts has challenged the notion that academic study can examine memes empirically. However, developments in neuroimaging may make empirical study possible. [11] Some commentators in the social sciences question the idea that one can meaningfully categorize culture in terms of discrete units, and are especially critical of the biological nature of the theory's underpinnings. [12] Others have argued that this use of the term is the result of a misunderstanding of the original proposal. [13]Lacan, Jacques 1985. Sign, symbol, imaginary. In M. Blonsky (ed.), On signs, 201–209. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Search in Google Scholar

Post, Stephen Garrard; Underwood, Lynn G.; Schloss, Jeffrey P.; Hurlbut, Willam B. (2002). Altruism & Altruistic Love: Science, Philosophy, & Religion in Dialogue. Oxford University Press. p.500. ISBN 9780195143584. In what sense then are replicators, whether genes or memes, selfish? The Selfish Gene popularised the view that biological evolution proceeds not for the benefit of the species or even the individual organism, but for the benefit of the underlying replicator. Dennett (1995), presses the important question ‘ Cui Bono?’ or ‘Who benefits?’ revealing the sense in which genes are ‘selfish’. They will get copied whenever and however they can, regardless of the consequences to anything else. This does not mean, as Dawkins pointed out over and over again, that the resulting organisms are selfish. Huma Dawkins cites as inspiration the work of geneticist L. L. Cavalli-Sforza, anthropologist F. T. Cloak, [27] [28] and ethologist J. M. Cullen. [29] Dawkins wrote that evolution depended not on the particular chemical basis of genetics, but only on the existence of a self-replicating unit of transmission—in the case of biological evolution, the gene. For Dawkins, the meme exemplified another self-replicating unit with potential significance in explaining human behavior and cultural evolution. Fracchia, Joseph; Lewontin, Richard (February 2005). "The price of metaphor". History and Theory. 44 (1): 14–29. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2303.2005.00305.x. ISSN 0018-2656. JSTOR 3590779. The selectionist paradigm requires the reduction of society and culture to inheritance systems that consist of randomly varying, individual units, some of which are selected, and some not; and with society and culture thus reduced to inheritance systems, history can be reduced to 'evolution.' ... We conclude that while historical phenomena can always be modeled selectionistically, selectionist explanations do no work, nor do they contribute anything new except a misleading vocabulary that anesthetizes history. There are many selfish people who are extremely original, then they take those pure ideas and use them to raise themselves up, that is an insincere move.” – Daniel SmithHeylighen, Francis. "Meme replication: The memetic life-cycle". Principia Cybernetica. Archived from the original on 4 October 2018 . Retrieved 26 July 2013. Stein, Gertrude. 1922. Sacred Emily. Geography and plays. https://www.lettersofnote.com/p/sacred-emily-by-gertrude-stein.html (accessed 21 March 2019). Search in Google Scholar