Cross-cultural peculiarities of the conflict betweeen the visual and verbal components viewed withing the framework of digitalization

The article focuses on the way such a digital genre as memes is being perceived by the Russian and Chinese respondents, whose visual cultures drastically differ. A set of 10 memes (5 Russian memes, 5 Chinese ones) was demonstrated to four experimental groups: Russian students (58 participants), Chinese students (50 participants), Russian experts in visual arts (6 participants), Chinese experts in visual arts (6 participants). The instruction was to evaluate the offered memes according to the set characteristics. The results revealed that to perceive the meme borrowed from a different visual culture respondents rely on its visual component. The interpretation of the meme belonging to the native culture is performed due to the analysis of both visual and verbal components. Noteworthy, such factors as belonging to a particular culture or expertise in the visual arts proved to be of no particular influence on meme perception.