Understanding Online Meaning‐Making: Normativity, Polycentricity, and Memetic Communication Through a Chronotopic‐Scalar Lens

ABSTRACT This article investigates memetic interaction as an illustrative example of complex polycentric online communication. Using a chronotopic‐scalar framework, it offers a theorized account of how online (inter)action works, how it is guided by (perceptions of) normativities, and how it is in dialogue with the “offline.” Specifically, I focus on Iranian migrant social media users and their performances of “Iranian‐migrant”‐ness through creating/sharing and reacting to, what I termed, “Persian diaspora memes.” I analyze how differently scaled chronotopes of normalcy associated with “here” (diaspora) and “there” (Iran) are invoked within the meme‐frame creating fertile ground for performing transnational identities. Additionally, I illustrate the utility of two key concepts in this framework ( chronotopization and chronotopic resolution ) in accounting for different (“mis”‐)interpretations of memes by different users and discuss the importance of this matter in researching online interaction. The study contributes theoretically and empirically to the scholarship on online communication and sociolinguistics of mobility.