If you were one of the thousands of students bored during the Hurricane Irma hiatus, you may have been invited to the exclusive UM Memes for Boujee Party Teens, a page dedicated to the creation and sharing of UM specific memes for all ‘Canes to participate in. Created by friends and grouped dubbed “MEME EDITORS™”, Sasha Manning, Elise Herschlag, Kara Roberts, Katya Saunders, Nyota Edjidjimo and Radhika Gore on August 1, the page now has over a 1,500 members and averages about three posts a day. Together, they collaborate, exchange and make ideas for the page.
Page administrator and creator, Sasha Manning explained, “I started the page because I saw that other colleges had meme pages such as UC Berkeley Memes for Edgy Teens with 100,000 members. I was kind of jealous that our school didn’t have one! I also wanted another outlet where UM students could interact and have fun. It’s great to see how much we ourselves have grown from 100 members to 1,000 in the span of just a week or two.”
Meme collaborator, Nyota Edjidjimo chimed in, “We’re happy that the meme page has gotten so successful. College can get really stressful and memes are a great way to laugh and bring people together.”
Similarly, fellow collaborator Elise Heschlag said, “It’s really cool to watch it grow, especially after the hurricane which gave us some great material even though it is unfortunate for everyone affected.”
The general rule of thumb is that if an idea is shared in the MEME EDITORS™ group chat and no one laughs or likes it, the post won’t make it to the Facebook page. Inspiration for the memes posted by the administrators comes from social media: trending memes on Twitter and Vine videos. Meme Collaborator, Radhika Gore said, “We want the memes light hearted and brings us together through UM/college struggles.”
While the moderators regularly post content to keep the page current, they encourage those who follow the page to share their own creations. Meme collaborator, Katya Saunders said, “It supposed to be a community of jokes so when others chime in it just adds to the fun.”
Here are some quotes from fans of the page:
Senior, Sabrina Cheikhali: “It’s something that I look and think ‘Wow, I relate to that’ but in a humorous way too.”
Senior, Zach Silberberg: “It helps give a chuckle when you need it. During the storm people were posting all the time and it was nice to have a laugh during such a stressful event.”
Senior, Alize Ramirez-Canas: “I like the page because it brings the student body closer together, especially when something like Hurricane Irma happens and it affects all of us.”
In the future, the group hopes to collaborate with UMTV to develop a comedy segment, and has already spoken to the Executive Producers of the Pulse division. Two of the meme collaborators, Kara Roberts and Sasha Manning worked for the Pulse last year creating comedy and prank segments. One of the videos they developed can be found here on the UM Memes for Boujee Party Teens page. Meme collaborator, Kara Roberts said, “We are currently setting up a meeting with them to organize our ideas and create a plan of action for future episodes.”
In the meantime, be sure to follow them here and scroll for some of my personal memes from the page.