JOURNAL OF EDUCATION AND LEARNING RESEARCH
Vol. 3 No. 3 (2026): JOURNAL OF EDUCATION AND LEARNING RESEARCH

A Study of Indonesian Youth’s Semantic Perception of English Political Memes on ‘What Is Up, Indonesia?’ Instagram Account

Salwa Shabra Shatilla (English Education Study Program, Universitas Riau, Pekanbaru,28293, Indonesia)
Erni Erni (English Education Study Program, Universitas Riau, Pekanbaru,28293, Indonesia)
Mahdum Mahdum (English Education Study Program, Universitas Riau, Pekanbaru,28293, Indonesia)



Article Info

Publish Date
10 May 2026

Abstract

Political memes have become a popular medium for conveying political messages on social media, particularly among young audiences. However, understanding such content requires the ability to interpret both explicit and implicit meanings. This study aims to examine Indonesian youth’s semantic perception of English political memes shared by the Instagram account What Is Up, Indonesia? (WIUI). Using a descriptive quantitative approach, the study involved 50 Indonesian youth aged 18–30 who actively use Instagram and are familiar with WIUI’s content. Data were collected through a 22-item questionnaire using a four-point Likert scale and analyzed using descriptive statistics. The findings indicate that respondents generally demonstrated a fairly good level of semantic perception. The highest understanding was observed in multimodal meaning and irony recognition, while clarity of meaning and evaluative perception showed greater variation. This study highlights the role of multimodal meaning in shaping interpretation and contributes to the limited research on how non-native English-speaking youth interpret political memes in digital contexts. Overall, English political memes can serve as an accessible medium for political communication among Indonesian youth.

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Journal Info

Abbrev

jelr

Publisher

Subject

Description

JELR is an open access Journal and publishes a scientific paper on the results of the study and review of the literature in the field of education after double-blind peer review. JELR publishes original articles on the latest issues and trends occurring regionally and internationally in the ...