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Anna Piata (National & Kapodistrian University of Athens), Lieven Vandelanotte (Universite de Namur)9/2/26, 9:00 AM
In this introduction to the seminar, we explore our overall theme: the use of English, often alongside images and emoji, in examples of various types of metadiscourse ‘in’ social media – self-reflexive forms of the discourse itself – but also ‘on’ or ‘about’ social media – i.e. discussions that emerge in society on social media usage. We offer discussion and sample analyses of both dimensions....
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Kate Scott (Kingston University)9/2/26, 9:30 AM
TikTok’s affordance for reusing the audio track of an existing post enables a distinctive form of multimodal meta discourse where users communicate not only through what they say, but through how they re contextualise another creator’s discourse. This paper analyses the “I Have One Daughter” TikTok sound meme as a form of meta meme in which creators perform patterns of conversational...
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Audrey Willoughby (University of Milan)9/2/26, 10:00 AM
This paper examines how textual-layer features in TikTok’s POV genre, specifically textual overlays and captions incorporating emojis and hashtags, function as metadiscursive cues that guide humorous interpretation. Following Hyland’s (2005) account of metadiscourse as discourse that frames interpretation and signals stance, these textual elements are treated as resources that organise how...
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Miriah Ralston (Teachers College, Columbia University)9/2/26, 10:30 AM
This paper explores the phenomenon of ventriloquizing dogs on social media, specifically focusing on TikTok. Much of the work that has been done with ventriloquizing has been in face-to-face interaction (Tannen, 2004). My research brings an asynchronous, computer-mediated approach to studying how ventriloquizing is done and what it achieves.
Using a multimodal framework informed by...
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Brittany Bryant (University of Cambridge)9/2/26, 3:00 PM
This paper examines mock language, a form of linguistic imitation in which speakers reproduce stylised features of other languages, such as the Mock Spanish expression ‘No problemo!’ or scribbles labelled as Chinese script. Framed as ‘non-serious’ (Hill 1993, p. 155) and frequently circulating through memes (Huang 2024), mock language is tolerated despite its (c)overt Othering, which...
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Nami Arimitsu (Toyo University)9/2/26, 3:30 PM
This paper examines cat memes and anthropomorphized characters in Japanese social media, focusing on how they function as pragmatic resources that soften stance-taking and affective expression. While multimodal meme constructions (Dancygier & Vandelanotte 2017, 2025) and stylistic–humorous effects (Piata 2020) are well documented, the pragmatic mechanism through which speakers delegate their...
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Eva Triebl (University of Vienna, English Department)9/2/26, 4:00 PM
Mental-health communities on social media have been critically discussed as sites that may foster epistemic closure and problematic forms of advice or self-understanding. Such concerns often presuppose a model of interaction centered on deliberation and epistemic consensus (Habermas 1981). This study instead conceptualizes these sites as interactional environments in which the norms of...
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Cedric Deschrijver (Ming Chuan University)9/2/26, 4:30 PM
The concepts ‘fake news’, ‘disinformation’, and ‘conspiracy theory’ are often perceived as denoting discrete and describable categories of problematic content. Yet in public discourse, besides functioning as classifications, these terms also function metadiscursively: their use reflects socially-mediated judgments on discourse, ideologically positions participants in interaction, and signals...
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