Celebrity Culture and Stardom
How film stars and celebrities are produced as cultural texts, and how fame functions as a system of meaning, value and power.
Definition
Celebrity culture is the social and media system through which public figures are produced, circulated and consumed as meaningful images; stardom is the specific form of celebrity, originating in cinema, in which performers are constructed as intertextual star images.
Scope
This topic examines the analysis of stardom and celebrity. It covers Dyer's foundational reading of stars as structured images, the production of celebrity by media and promotional industries, typologies of fame (ascribed, achieved and attributed), and the cultural functions celebrities perform. It supplies the core conceptual apparatus of celebrity studies, complementing the area's topics on spectacle, reality TV and online microcelebrity.
Core questions
- How does Dyer read film stars as cultural texts rather than mere individuals?
- How are celebrities produced by media and promotional industries?
- What different types of celebrity can be distinguished?
- What cultural and ideological functions does celebrity perform?
Key concepts
- the star image
- celebrity sign
- ascribed, achieved and attributed celebrity
- promotion
- para-social relationship
- the celebrity industry
Key theories
- The star image
- Dyer argues that a star is a structured, intertextual image assembled across films, publicity and commentary, which encodes and negotiates ideological meanings about identity and society.
- Celebrity as cultural sign
- Marshall analyses the celebrity as a powerful cultural sign that articulates the individual within consumer capitalism and democratic culture, conferring and channelling social meaning.
- Types of celebrity
- Rojek distinguishes ascribed celebrity (inherited), achieved celebrity (earned through accomplishment) and attributed celebrity (manufactured by media), clarifying the varied bases of fame.
History
The academic study of stardom began in film studies, where Dyer's Stars (1979) established the analysis of stars as ideological texts. From the late 1990s celebrity studies broadened the inquiry: Marshall's Celebrity and Power (1997), Rojek's Celebrity (2001) and Turner's Understanding Celebrity (2004) theorised celebrity as a media and economic system, laying foundations for a now well-established interdisciplinary field.
Debates
- Talent versus manufacture
- Whether celebrity reflects genuine achievement and charisma, or is largely manufactured by media industries through promotion and attention regardless of accomplishment.
Key figures
- Richard Dyer
- P. David Marshall
- Graeme Turner
- Chris Rojek
Related topics
Seminal works
- dyer1979
- marshall1997
- rojek2001
- turner2004
Frequently asked questions
- Why analyse a star as a 'text'?
- Because a star's public meaning is not simply the person but an image built up across films, interviews, advertising and gossip. Reading that image as a text lets analysts ask what social values and tensions it expresses, and for whom.