Aguerri 1

Adriana Aguerri

Emily Hensley

ENC 1101

October 24, 2022

Little Miss

In the world we live in today technology is always stepping up its game. The trends we

idolize right now most likely won’t even trend in the next week. With that many teens nowadays

are always on a new wave of trends or memes that many adults do not understand. One thing

however that is very apparent today is that trends do tend to circle back from the older generation

to the new generation. For instance, juicy couture suits, y2k style, and even Ugg’s have made a

huge comeback in society today. It’s obvious how often the new generation copies from the older

generation regardless of if they truly want to accept it. My artifact of Little Miss is a prime

example of the new generation taking something from the older generation and making it trend.

Little Miss is a fictional character that was created way before I was even born, but somehow got

brought back into life via social media. The artifact of Little Miss will go into the rhetorical

velocity of the original work itself and how its composed now, how rhetorical circulation is

involved, and the intertextuality of it that allowed it to become the trend it is today.

The Little Miss meme went around during the summer this

past year and caused many to put their own twist to it. The

rhetorical velocity of the trend has allowed the original to be

changed in many ways. In fact, James Ridolfo stated that “tying

into the notion of delivery as not just a transaction but as successful

communication” (“Digital Rhetoric: Theory”). Which describes the

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process of recomposing the original to fit the means of one message for themselves or to show to

their community. This rhetorical velocity is what got Little Miss to be changed and

communicated in ways for others and the ripple affect followed leading to the big trend of it.

Nevertheless, many know this trend started on TikTok but that’s not exactly when Little Miss

started. British Author Roger Hargreaves created a children’s book series of “Mr Men” and

“Little Miss” throughout 1971 to 1981 till his death in 1988. His son Adam Hargreaves decided

to continue this series following his father’s death. However, he started to add illustrations such

as “Mr Cool, Mr Rude, Little Miss Scary, Little Miss Princess,” and so many more. As of 2022

there are around 92 “Mr Men” and “Little Miss” characters that

have their own book that give an underlying story of their trait. In

2021, the use of Tumblr started to gain some traction for the

Little Miss characters. The initial Little Miss meme, according to

the Know Your Meme blog, was created in June of 2021 by

notyourgaybestie who then went to Tumblr and shared, “Little Miss Smokes Too Much Weed”.

From this initial reconstruction of Little Miss, it soon found itself on all forms of social media

with everyone putting their own touch to the lighthearted childhood characters.

Moreover, circulation has allowed for this meme to reach multiple discourse communities

not just through books but with the help from social media. Douglas Eyman expressed that when

a platform allows for a variety of people and communities to discuss and give their perception on

it then in circulation occurs (“Digital Rhetoric: Theory”). This so-called platform is social media,

as mentioned before which is Tumblr, Twitter, and nowadays TikTok. This platform has allowed

for the Little Miss meme to spread and impact many people. TikTok has just around 30 million

people using the app, around 200 million people visit Tumblr, and twitter has about 450 active
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users as well. Just from these three networks it’s so easy to understand how widespread a small

trend like Little Miss can become such a phenomenon that it is now. These platforms gave

different groups a chance to take their own interpretation on the trend. In today’s norms it’s hard

to hold a conversation with outside groups because they tend to not share their ideals positively.

However, the fact that “Little Miss” allowed for the negativity of many parts of social media to

stay out and let everyone partake in the trend gave it the height to be an internet sensation of a

meme. Thus, all this exposure allowed for the circulation to happen at a faster speed and

allowing it to have the impact it did.

Due to the widespread of the trend, it is noted to see how so many people, communities,

and even companies have put their unique flare on the Little Miss meme. For instance, when

making an original copy into one of your own or changed to something related to your discourse

community it is correlated to intertextuality. James E. Porter explains that intertextuality is the

basis that “all texts contain some previous trace of another text in terms of idea or originality.”

(Porter, Writing about Writing,542). Evidently, this means the work produced is never fully

original and so many outside or insider things inspire the outcome of the work. Complimenting

my artifact, the original set of Little Miss and Mr. Men give examples of one character trait and

the book that follows it relays a message or motif for the reader to learn about the certain

character. However, with the new TikTok trend many don’t see some motif to teach children a

message. The foundations of the meme are still instilled with the intertextuality even though it

can go unnoticed. As shown on page one it is an original character of Little Miss a yellow circle

with red hair and two pigtails with the title of “Little Miss Trouble”. But when creating new

versions of the meme creators will change up the character with different color of body, hair,

adding jewelry, making it a different gender, and even adding a little souvenir to express their
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new character even more. As shown on the page, a girl created a new version of the Little Miss

meme making it “Little Miss cries to Taylor Swift even

when happy”. In this new Little Miss, we see a new type of

character one who is extremely girly and has an essence of a

young happy character which is what many say Taylor Swift

exemplifies unless you decided to listen to her album

Folklore. Going on, the intertextuality shines through this

newly created meme because the original is still there the with big bold words and cute character

evoking a more illustrated description for the words. These changes can be seen by so many

communities as my three examples in the text have demonstrated. They all discourse into certain

communities, topics, and parts of social media with still relying on the original as the framework.

Therefore, the intertextuality of Little Miss allowed it to gain the momentum to create a variety

to follow through in the trend.

In all, it is highly noted how the Little Miss meme that trended over the summer really

took over social media in a numerous number of ways. Supported by rhetorical velocity,

circulation, and intertextuality it is hard to argue that Little Miss is not a prominent artifact in our

age of social media. How different communities came together for one meme is remarkable and

allows for the understanding that so many things are inspired or reflected from others. Even

though the original creator Roger Hargreaves is no longer here today to see how his book

characters take social media by storm, it is quite plausible to say he did not expect “Little Miss

smokes too much weed” to re-introduce a new generation to Little Miss.

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Works Cited

Bisht, Bhawana. “Who Is Little Miss? Everything You Need to Know about This Social Media

Trend.” SheThePeople TV, SheThePeople, 27 July 2022,

https://www.shethepeople.tv/trending/little-miss-trend-explained/.

“Little Miss Smokes Too Much Weed: Little Miss Memes.” Know Your Meme, 11 July 2022,

https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2402086-little-miss-memes--2.

Adams, Jen Shiori. “Little Miss Memes Are Taking over the Internet, so Here Are 20 of the

Funniest Ones I've Seen.” BuzzFeed, BuzzFeed, 21 July 2022,

https://www.buzzfeed.com/jenniferadams2/20-little-miss-memes.

Midnights, Mariah ✧. “Little Miss Is Me Pic.twitter.com/dwrsg49bx9.” Twitter, Twitter, 12 July

2022,

https://twitter.com/alltooriah/status/1546981990221729795?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwc

amp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1546981990221729795%7Ctwgr%5E4339fd181c50

cb249b1911e909ffd105de700b02%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bu

zzfeed.com%2Fjenniferadams2%2F20-little-miss-memes.

Porter, James E. “Intertextuality and the Discourse Community.” Rhetoric Review, vol. 5, no. 1,

1986, pp. 34–47., https://doi.org/10.1080/07350198609359131.

Hargreaves, Roger. “Little Miss Trouble by Roger Hargreaves.” Goodreads, Goodreads, 24 Aug.

1998, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1200809.Little_Miss_Trouble.