Lit Review
According to Arthur Asa Berger in his work Cultural Criticism: Semiotics and Cultural Criticism, semiotics is the science of signs. Berger explains semiotics via the theories of Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure and American philosopher C.S. Peirce. A sign consists of a signifier and a signified, the signifier is the object, sound, or image that relates to the signified concept, Saussure posits, Another fundamental concept in semiotics is Peirce’s concept of the trichotomy: icon, index and symbol (Berger, 2010).
Icons resemble what they are signifying, so one can see to understand. Indexes have a causal connection, like smoke and fire, and one can through reason interpret it. Symbols, however, must be learned to be understood–things like words and flags cannot be understood without cultural context and social learning (Berger, 2010).
Berger gives the example of the symbols of in the 1434 painting Giovanni Arnolfini and His Bride by Ian Van Eyck. The bowl of fruit on the table symbolizes the Virgin Mary, the wife’s hand on her stomach symbolizes the bearing of children, the dog represents fidelity, and while these symbols would have been obvious then, in our time most might not be familiar with these symbols (Berger, 2010).
Connotation, according to Berger, is the cultural meanings attached to the term or image that is the signifier. Denotation then is the term or image taken at face value––what it means literally (Berger, 2010).
Berger’s theory of semiotics will provide an avenue in which to explore the sorts of cultural meaning making users on TikTok create… but how do they construct group identities?
A study by Pérez-Torres, Pastor-Ruiz, and Ben-Boubaker, three faculty from Rey Juan Carlos University in Madrid, Spain, analyzed how Spanish adolescents constructed identity through their use of Youtube. They looked at a set of different Youtube videos and their comments for a content analysis of them. They found that adolescents frequently are interacting with each other and sharing stories related to their gender, sexual, vocational, and social identities. They found that the video creators end up acting as a role model for their followers and can have a strong impact on how they form their identity (Perez-Torres, 2018). This provides insight on how TikTok users (of whom the majority are adolescents) in similar ways through the sharing of videos and comments construct their identities and see fellow creators as role models in their formulation of identity. A key difference between Youtube and TikTok however is the length of the video, which means different content: Youtubers can make long videos about a variety of topics, but TikTok is similar to Vine in that the videos are short and the content is usually for entertainment and not for information. However, using a semiotic approach, different signs in users’ videos still contribute to a group identity, through the use of language, dress, behaviours, and other symbols, especially music.
An important concept of TikTok culture is that of “cringe” which comes back from at least its Musical.ly origins. A video that is cringey is one that is amateurish, embarrassing, but also expressing a certain level of authenticity and vulnerability. Sometimes cringey videos by someone of a perceived out-group can spark negative attention. Taylor Lorenz in an article from The Atlantic interviewed a TikTok user and furry, or someone who has an animal persona, or fursona, if you will: “‘If you’re abnormal in any way, shape, or form, kids will come on and make fun of you,’ Mitchell said. ‘LGBT, disabled, or anyone in a fandom that’s anything outside of the norm [will get harassed]. I don’t really let it get to me; it’s just horrifying to see which direction the internet is going.’” (Lorenz, 2018)
This is an example of how social groups within TikTok often have negative reactions to each other. A study entitled “What makes a video go viral? An analysis of emotional contagion and Internet meme’, published in the journal Computers in Human Behavior, make an analysis of what kinds of videos go viral, and with whom are one is likely to share a viral video with. They found that there is a strong emotional element when we decide to share videos. The idea of emotional contagion is important in this analysis of the viral nature of TikTok. They found that people are more willing to share negative content when the sender is someone of an out-group identity. This concept ties in to the cringe conception, and provides insight into why we share videos we find to be embarrassing (Guadagno, 2013).