EXAM 1 Flashcards
CELEBRITY AS… (3)
- CELEBRITY AS PATHOLOGY (at the top)
- Fame and celebrity are scandalous, corrupt and contemptable
- Wanting to be famous is constructed as something vacuous, greedy
- People questioning the connection between fame, celebrity and talent; because think it’s unearned
- View: celebrity does not have to be connected to any type of skill or intelligence, but the people who are famous more successfully promoted themselves
- CELEBRITY AS COMMODITY
- We want celebrity because it is being SOLD to us
- CAPITALISM
- We give ourselves up to the easy pleasures of life - CELEBRITY AS MEANING
- Makes room for multi-dimensional experience of celebrity
FAME VS CELEB
- Fame: a limited status, associated with individual demonstrations of superior skill
- Have to have a skill set
- Celebrity: transient, relying on marketing, timing and instant appeal
Ø Celeb admits more figures than definition of fame allows
Ø A force that valorizes individualism
Ø Love island people example
Ø Key to celebrity: getting people to know you so that they CARE about you, EX: kim k
ROJEKS TAXONOMY OF FAME
Ø Ascribed
- you don’t have a say (prince harry)
Ø Achieved - You do have a say, achieved status of professor (lebron James) Ø Attributed - Television personality (ryan seacrest) Ø Celetoid - Celebrities that don't fit in, YouTube personalities, social media influencers - Category of celeb where there is hypervisibility, but super short lived, hawk tuah girl
HISTORY OF CELEB: THE RISE OF MASS CULTURE
- ASTORS PLACE RIOTS
- P.T BARNUM
- RAILWAY
- PHOTOGRAPHY/NEW VISIBILITY (1830’S)
- NEWSPAPERS (1880’S)
- RISE OF MIDDLE CLASS: MORE TIME TO THEMSELVES
- VAUDEVILLE
- POP WENT UP
- CELEB MAGAZINES
- CELEB SCANDAL
WHAT IS SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY
- Helps us make sense of social life
- It holds observations and facts TOGETHER
- Imperial observations only make sense because we are interpreting within a type of theoretical framework
- Theories make assumptions explicit, by doing so, it opens them up to examination and reformation
WEBER AND CHARASMATIC LEADERSHIP: LEGITIMATE DOMINATION
- Legal authority:
- sometimes rational
- domination is based on the rule of rationally established laws
- Authority is not to that specific person, but the office of the law enforcement we are obeying
- “what was continues to be”
- Traditional authority
- Might be a king, tribal leader
- “what was, is” - Charismatic authority
- Derives from an individual person’s charisma
- The charisma that is possessed by the leader
- The obedience is legitimated by that person seeming gifts
- Sim between trad and char, both have loyalty that is owed to a person not an OFFICE
- It hasn’t always been like this, but rather based on the leaders charisma to convince others they are “worth it” for example
- Ex: alexander the great gets his obedience because he convinces everyone else of it
- Charismatic leadership: demands for obedience are legitimated by the leader’s ”gift of grace”
- Loyalty owed to the person, not the office
- Charisma lasts only as long as the person is charge is able to provide benefits to their people
- Used as a starting point to examine how celebrities do it
- Charisma is applied to a certain quality of a person’s personality and treated as endowed, supernatural (weber quote)
- Hiccup: Weber suggests that this would be VERY rare, but we are surrounded with celebrities
WEBER: CLASS, STATUS, PARTY
Status groups: a specific, positive or negative, social estimation of honor
Ø They are communities
Ø WEBER: the fate of these groups are not because of their position or group,
Ø the fate is determined by a social estimation of honor
Ø People make assumptions based on clothes, jobs etc, and they serve to limit interactions (ex: rich socialites only interact with other rich people)
Ø Once you can BUY your way into these memberships, we no longer think that is a good representation of social honor
Ø Ex: celebrities that bought their way into elite colleges, then it is no longer a good representation of social honor
Ø therefore they use very strict measures to control who can be apart of it
- Expressed through “style of life” or “conventions” Race, ethnicity, religion, taste in fashion and the arts, and occupation
- Once a membership into a style of life can be bought its ability to function as an expression of social honor or exclusivity is threatened
- Weber argued that status groups would eventually fade, once we move away from it, status itself would be less important
- Argued that class would decrease in importance too, article argues that this is not the case at all, rather the opposite
PRIVILEGES THAT COME WITH CELEB (4)
- Interactional Privilege
Ø Attention
Ø Idea that how the regular people interact with celebrities
Ø We get nervous, etc
Ø Reinforces their superior status, nobody asks a regular person for their picture
Ø Mundane things they do still get attention - Normative Privilege
Ø Mimics and poseurs, authority, charisma
Ø Idea that celebs are role models, right or wrong
Ø Status elites have always attracted mimics, posers
Ø Sanctuary laws: prevent people from buying things in order to keep those things exclusive to that particular group - Economic Privileges
Ø Fame is lucrative
Ø No shit, you make a lot of $$
Ø Capitalism accelerated the way celebs make money
Ø Brand deals, their own companies, etc - Legal Privileges
Ø Right to publicity
Ø Celebs own their image, they control when it’s used
STATUS DEFINITION
the accumulated approvals and disapprovals that people express toward an individual, a collectivity, or an object
- Visibility is an important component to having high status
4 KEY ELEMENTS TO STATUS
- Status is an in alienable resource
Ø You cannot transfer status from one person to another
Ø Because people’s opinions make up status
Ø A drug dealer would not be of high status- status is relatively in expansible
Ø Contrast this power against others, ex: political power
Ø Celebs can expand their power ONLY IN SOME CASES, ex: Kanye running for president
Ø Why? Because in order for some to be high status, there needs to be people of low status - Gain status through conformity to collective norms
Ø Accent, domineer, body language can be indicators of status
Ø Clothing and fashion (but can be acquired easily) that’s why trends change all the time, because the higher ups change it when the lower catch up and buy look alkies on sheen - Gain status from social associations
Ø If you associate with higher status people, your status goes up, if it’s lower status, yours goes down
- status is relatively in expansible
MECHANICAL AND ORGANIC SOLIDARITY (DURK)
Ø Either way, every society needs a division of labor
Ø Economic benefits of division of labor, but most importantly the social benefits to it
Ø The social result of that division is social solidarity
Ø In simpler societies, people share feelings that can lead to social solidarity
Ø Acts as a common conciousness
ORGANIC SOLIDARITY THE UNIFYING FORCE OF THE SECULAR WORLD
Ø The unifying force of the secular force
Ø As the power of religion is diminishing, we see other things becoming more important, science, politics, etc
Ø Organic solidarity characterized by a bunch of differences
Ø Comes from the division of labor
GOFFMAN FRONT STAGE BACK STAGE
- Idea of authenticity: we tend to admire in celebs when they’re authentic, we don’t like when they are fake / not genuine
- Often unspoken yet precise rules of how we present ourselves to others
- Front stage/back stage
- Impression management: celebs have a deliberate public persona
- BUT the front stage needs to appear as authentic
- Back stage is where all the work happens to maintain the front stage: concealing things, making people sign NDA’s, etc
- The audience (paparazzi, gossip magazines, Deux Moi, etc) watch celebrities and determine how genuine and likeable they are
CELEBRITY CULTURE AS A RESPONSE TO THE RISE IN BUREAUCRACIES
Bureaucracy: characterized by hierarchical structures, impersonal rules, emphasized rational rules of organizations, and the specific allocation of duties to specific job descriptions
- Problem with classes: can ask professor, but she only has one role, will send you to someone else. EVERYONE HAS ONE ROLE,
- Depersonalize: EVERYONE IS TREATED THE SAME WAY
- Ex: desk job
- In bur. There is no way to differentiate one worker from the other
* Celebrities offer a fantasy escape from this dehumanization/ bureaucracy
- Ex: celebs don’t wait in line
* interpersonal and legal privileges
CELEB CULUTRE AND NEOLIBERALISM
Market fundamentalism and trickle-down economics
* The market, not governments, redistribute wealth
* Neoliberalism insists on and promotes the need for an idealized, productive citizen
- Late 1970’s early 1980’s, lot of economic conditions; high inflation, low employment, so as a response, the neoliberal ideology came about, which abended how we approach problems
- Even with the gov, no economic growth, a response to the idea of the gov
- The gov needs to be hands off, things need to be privatized and we need to strengthen the individual rather than the government
- Idea of that the market will take care of itself, we don’t need welfare, child benefits, etc
- Trickle down economics, the positive effect will “trickle down” to everything else
- Idea that if you work hard enough, you should eb able to get a job, etc
- Promotes the idea for the idealized citizen
- Ex: it’s not enough that you like painting, you should monetize your interests; sell your paintings on etsy
- Celebs are an example of this “celebs work hard, so therefore they succeed”
- OSAP EX: neoliberalists would say the gov shouldn’t help you, you should be able to do it on your own
- Working hard as individuals is the key to a successful society
* No structural, institutional obstacles
* Celebrities personify the benefits of constant self-cultivation, self-monitoring, and self-transformation
