During the more than three days stretching between the 2020 U.S. election day and when the presidential race was officially “called” for Democratic candidate Joe Biden, a blizzard of memes snowed down across social media. This project analyzes more than 500 of these “election week limbo” memes, created and shared during a prolonged moment of collective political anticipation and anxiety. What emerged in this sample was a spontaneous, collaborative and evolving moment of meme-based storytelling that mirrored a classic five-act storytelling structure. Meme-ers sustained this narrative for most of a week, not simply to generate new, humorous takes on an iconic photo. Rather, they collectively evolved the shared tale of a distinct political moment during an isolating pandemic, capturing the “election limbo” story memetically as moods shifted, plot twists emerged and unlikely heroes came to the forefront, creating a distinctly collaborative, narrative, and evolving meme storytelling experience.

中文翻译：

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“嗯，又是选举日……再次”：多天的模因叙事如何在 2020 年“选举周 Limbo”期间捕捉到世界的集体期待

在 2020 年美国大选日和民主党候选人乔·拜登正式“召集”总统竞选之间的三天多时间里，社交媒体上铺天盖地的表情包。该项目分析了 500 多个“选举周边缘”模因，这些模因是在长时间的集体政治预期和焦虑中创造和分享的。在这个样本中出现的是一个自发的、协作的和不断发展的基于 meme 的讲故事的时刻，它反映了经典的五幕讲故事结构。Meme-ers 在一周的大部分时间里都在维持这种叙述，而不仅仅是为了对一张标志性的照片产生新的幽默感。相反，他们共同进化了在孤立的大流行期间一个独特的政治时刻的共同故事，随着情绪的变化，模因地捕捉了“选举边缘”的故事，