Aglioti Colombini J. L’Università dei meme: Tra strategie di resistenza digitale e costruzione di comunità affettive

Authors: Junio Aglioti Colombini

Abstract

This article explores how digital culture, and particularly internet memes, has transformed the experience of university life. Through a case study of the Instagram page @Memesunipi, it analyzes how memes function as devices for emotional re-elaboration, enabling students to cope with anxiety, precarity, and academic pressure. Memes are interpreted both as tools of individual catharsis and as catalysts for the creation of affective publics and informal student communities. The study highlights how memetic practices offer alternative narratives to the dominant meritocratic and performative rhetoric of neoliberal academia. By tracing the intersection between platform logics, collective storytelling, and emotional solidarity, the article shows how memes contribute to reconfiguring the boundaries of contemporary student participation and critical agency within the university space.

Keywords: Internet Memes, Digital Culture, Public Sphere, Instagram, Counter Publics, Affective Publics.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.13131/hbka-j687

Notes on contributors

JUNIO AGLIOTI COLOMBINI è assegnista di ricerca presso il Dipartimento di Scienze politiche dell’Università di Pisa.
Email: junio.aglioticolombini@sp.unipi.it