The article analyzes Soviet symbols that are present in Internet memes — an important, developing part of modern communication. Despite the fact that the Internet meme has many definitions, the article presents a clear, heuristic view that considers the Internet meme as an element of the emerging metalanguage. Such an understanding is possible due to the structure of an Internet meme, which contains an unchangeable part (language) and a changing part in every new picture (speech). This optics allows us to consider an Internet meme as a saying available for analysis.

Using this provision, the article examines the existence and functioning of Soviet symbols in Internet memes. They are usually the subject of various studies of cultural and historical memory. Despite the great attention paid to the Soviet memory discourse, researchers mainly focus on the confrontation of positive and critical memory about the Soviet experience and on the construction of such memory. The author puts forward the thesis about the presence of Soviet symbols outside this discourse and its consolidation in cultural memory and everyday communication on the Internet. The involvement of Soviet symbols can be found outside the paradigm of memory construction and any explicit political discourses. At the same time, Soviet symbols regularly appear in new Internet memes, acting as a universal, understandable code of culture. Symbols such as the hammer and sickle, the red star, the May Day demonstration, figures of leaders and many others serve as a matrix of understanding for everyday communication, purified from purely historical discourses.

Using various examples, the article demonstrates symbols, seemingly irrelevant to a young audience, which are successfully used in Internet memes that play out a variety of situations. This approach makes it possible to implement the interdisciplinary paradigm in the studies of cultural memory in the digital environment, using the methods of cultural theorists and the methods of media researchers.