The “Pepper-Spraying Cop” Icon and Its Internet Memes: Social Justice and Public Shaming Through Rhetorical Transformation in Digital Culture

Abstract

Within hours of its publication online, the “pepper-spraying cop” image from the Occupy Wall Street movement at the University of California–Davis became an Internet meme. The outraged public manipulated key signifiers of the famous picture, creating hundreds of digital derivatives that offered new takes on what happened. With the use of iconographic tracking and visual rhetorical analysis, the study argues that Internet memes are more than silly jokes or social commentary. Through rhetorical transfigurations, they can deliver social justice and launch public shaming campaigns, serving as online instruments to respond to an off-line event.

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Notes on contributors

Natalia Mielczarek

Natalia Mielczarek is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg. Her research interests include visual rhetoric, iconicity, Internet memetics, and instrumentalization of images in digital participatory culture. She is a former print journalist. E-mail: [email protected]