The meme I created highlighted a common issue many students in CCNY face jokingly, which is, the escalators in the main NAC building not working. For multiple years, students would go through the slog of making it to Harlem, climbing the tiring hill leading to campus, waiting at the front to have the security guard meticulously checking their ids and phones and all of that, just to walk up an escalator that should’ve been fixed a long time ago.

 I heavily exaggerated the meme itself. I don’t genuinely believe society would like that if the escalators worked, however, I meant to imply that most of the CCNY society would be better off if they did. The progress in the future of the picture is meant to signify the happiness the students, the faculty, and professors would face heading towards their classes or anywhere around campus; there are no disadvantages to fixing the escalators and would generally benefit everyone. The intended audience for this meme would be primarily students of CCNY and the staff working there, this is because many students know the annoyance of the escalators not working and consistently complain about them even today. To be specific, there are many pages on social media talking about how angry they are about it not working. I appealed to my audience in a format most students would find relatable and enjoyable, and the best way to do that would be to make a meme; I have already gotten a lot of laughs and reactions to this meme and many of which are people agreeing with it. It’s an easily digestible format that can also highlight some issues without going too in-depth about an issue, just enough to show that it’s a problem. The format of the meme which was the single image helped given my situation since it wasn’t overly complicated, just like how fixing the escalator shouldn’t be complicated as well. I was able to form a connection with the students easily since, I myself, am a student at CCNY, so naturally I can relate to this common issue that plagues many of the students’ mornings.

It also does relate to language and literature, if you closely look at the image, you can see how the ideal society is perceived in many people’s eyes, one distinct image or culture if you will. A utopic society is often seen as the ideal society under one identity with everyone understanding each other, this image is meant to represent that. For example, the man in the image is the ideal human in terms of most people, active, muscular and being proactive on his day off. The perfect society would ideally be a society with everyone sharing the same culture identity and being able to comprehend one another, this would also tie into how we as students, ideally also want the escalators to work. Ideally, we as students want the same goal while in college, this image is the culmination of that, with there being no clear distinct language or identity being shown; just one unified advanced society.

Overall, I chose the meme format to convey how I and many students feel about this issue since it was a simple and fun way to showcase the problem. I also wanted to bring up how it could relate to language and literacy by showcasing how it breaks down cultural and language barriers. It brought about many laughs, and reactions, and most of all, it brought people together about the issue at hand, which is spending some of the tuition we give the college to at the very least fix one simple escalator.