Tropes and Memes

Tropes

A trope is a recurring element which is repeated over time and forms a common convention.

For example, we can pick up on the typical vampire tropes:

- They can't go out in the sun/ their skin burns in sunlight

- They sleep in coffins

- They have extremely pale white/grey skin

- They are allergic to garlic and crucifixes

- They can be killed with stake through the heart

- They can transform into bats and wolves

- They wear long black capes

More recently, these tropes have evolved as vampires have been introduced back into the film industry. For example,

- They no longer burn in the sun, they just sparkle

- They have super strength and super speed

- They feed off animals to get rid of their thirst for human blood, and sometimes they don't feed at all (this is the complete opposite to what vampires used to be like)

- They live in the normal world with normal people

- They're not only seen as monsters but people who blend into society

This can be related to pop music because it typically has ideological tropes such as being non-sexual, focusing on love rather than

hate, being clean and fresh and quite cheesy. Nowadays, it has evolved just like the vampire tropes have and it is now much more sexual, perhaps due to influences from different genres such as R'n'B or hip hop and also due to changes in society. For example, people are much more aware of sex these days, and are less likely to be shocked by anything they hear in song lyrics. In addition to this, the tropes of pop magazines used to completely revolve around the music that new pop artists and bands were producing, and nothing more. As pop magazines have become less and less popular and begun to diminish, the tropes have acclimatized (just as the vampire ones did) to suit their target audience's preferences. These days, pop magazines such as 'Top Of The Pops' have tropes which largely involve celebrity relationship gossip and celebrity style information, which is a total contrast to the solely music-based tropes of the past.

Memes

A meme identifies ideas or beliefs that are transmitted from one person or group of people to another. Memes are like the "genes" of culture and often somehow appear in the media simultaneously without given reason. For example, Pixar released the film 'Finding Nemo' and several weeks later Dreamworks released the film 'Shark Tale', which was immensely similar, yet there had been no connection or copying of content between the two. It was totally unexplained. In the music industry, Lily Allen and Kate Nash came about at the same kind of time and their general sound was fairly similar. They both had the "Mockney" style of singing which really emphasized the fact they were both from London and had Cockney accents. In addition to this, they both had fairly controversial and rude song lyrics, which was completely new to the pop industry and had never been explored before. These type of ideas become memes which eventually form tropes. For example, there are now the likes of Eliza Doolittle and Jessie J who are similar to Lily Allen and Kate Nash to a point.