Pog, Jeanine Dinh Purgatory, Evangelos Arnokouros……………………………………………………………214

Pog

Jeanine Dinh

The term, “Pog”, is used to indicate excitement, joy, intrigue or an epic moment in online spaces. Pog is an acronym that means “play of the game” but is mainly used by users in the video game space as an expression after something incredible, epic, or exciting has taken place. POGGERS can be used synonymously with POG. Used mainly within the video game live streaming community it can be found in the chat section to express excitement, amazement, or disbelief when a live streamer pulls off an impressive play or a talented skill. When someone says "Pog" after accomplishing something it usually means "Yay! I did it! Epic!". “Pog” is one of the oldest emotive terms and popularised by the users of the Twitch community. The term is inspired by and a reference to the Twitch emote "PogChamp". The original PogChamp emote is a photo of Ryan “Gootecks” and was created from an image of Ryan while he was on a film set. He watched a camera man knock over a tripod and this was his natural expression. Ryan was shocked, mouth agape, with a surprised expression across his face. The photo was taken and turned into an emote which became incredibly popular amongst the video game community. This term is important as it reflects ways in which adolescents represent themselves online or create their own representation online. There are opportunities online for adolescents to cohort or find groups of people with similar interests. Within these groups they create their own culture, habits and understandings of said space. “Pog” is one of the oldest emotive terms that users in the video game space use and created. Similarly to memes, it gives adolescents a way to express themselves and also connect to one another. Providing a sense of sameness, understanding and connection between users in the space. The creation of “pog” displays how youth find ways to accurately express themselves in a virtual space. This connects to youth’s health and well-being by trying to authentically connect to their virtual spaces and virtual community members. By being able to appropriately express their emotion or reaction they are able to share the space with others. This is extremely important in the live streaming space (where this term is typically used). For example, during live esports events, there can sometimes be thousands up to millions of people watching virtually from their own space. When an impressive play happens or a specific team wins, youth are able to share the same excitement by flooding the chat with “pog” or “poggers” or “pogchamp” emotes.

Sources Literally Media Ltd. (2022, October 19). Pogchamp. Know Your Meme. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pogchamp

theScore Esports. (2017, May 26). What is PogChamp? [A trip down meme-Ory

Lane]. YouTube. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcY7AyFojok

Puragatory

Evangelos Arnokouros

The innocence of childhood has fully expired by high school; however, adulthood is far beyond reach. The word purgatory aptly describes the experience of high school from the mind of a high school student. According to Britannica, purgatory is defined as: “the condition, process, or place of purification or temporary punishment in which [...] the souls of those who die in a state of grace are made ready for heaven” (Zaleski, 2022). Similar to the bridge between the living and the dead, high school acts as the bridge between adolescence and adulthood. Furthermore, Britannica goes on to list three components of purgatory: “Prayer for the dead, an active interim state between death and resurrection, and a purifying fire after death” (Zaleski, 2022). These components relate to the high school experience in the following ways: firstly, high school is a place to pray for the death of one’s childhood. High school students recall the nurture they felt in their youth and mourn the loss of renewing those experiences. Secondly, they remain in an active state between childhood and adulthood, similar to Britannica's idea of living between life and death, awaiting heaven. Lastly, purgatory is a place to purify one’s soul through fire in order to be prepare for heaven, similar to how high school is a place in which adolescents anticipate adulthood. Crucial to our development, human beings need a source of containment. According to Waddell, containment is carried out by a mother or teacher towards someone else in order to help them “make sense” of their experience (Waddell, 2002, p.37). These vessels of containment listen and become present by way of containing the range of emotion that an adolescent is feeling. The chaotic emotions that one feels in high school may be an external reaction to an internal problem that the youth may not know exists. Thus, high school teachers attune

themselves to their students through containment and prepare them for the world after high school.

Containment can be viewed as a means in which something is kept within a limit, in the same way purgatory has its limits; a soul stuck in limbo that cannot move forward from one place to the next, limited to only roam the lands between. The psychic and physical toll of growing up is contained within high school - be that via a teacher or a peer. High school students will endure hardships and attempt to make sense of the world around them. Thus, this is a process that is needed in order to transition into adulthood, akin to a soul having to purify themselves in purgatory in order to reach heaven. High school is therefore a place where adolescents are preparing for the world outside of an academic context – a world filled with joy and love but also pain and hardship. In other words, the high school students mourn the rose-coloured memories of their youth while anxiously awaiting adulthood. All in all, the idea of being in-between stages is ever present within high school, and the word purgatory appropriately describes the experience.

References

Waddell, M. (2002). Inside Lives: Psychoanalysis and the Growth of the Personality (1st ed.).

Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429475979 Zaleski, C. (2022, August 30). Purgatory. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/purgatory-Roman-Catholicism