Below is an example of a third year essay that got a first. Nonetheless it is not the best essay in the world. Do not think of it as a template but as an example of the approach you should be thinking about and some indication of what you are looking to achieve. Consider how something such as TV celebrity that might be discussed in a conversation is approached in the academic form of an essay.
Identify and analyse some of the roles television plays in the creation and reproduction of celebrity culture. Discuss with reference to one or two reality TV programmes.
There is considerable academic debate about what exactly constitutes celebrity, the reasons for celebrity and the social role of celebrity. However, it seems clear that celebrity concerns individuals with a presence in the public sphere and how their lives both public and private – with an emphasis on the personal attributes of the individual – are given public meaning, are culturally constructed, both by activity in cultural industries and by the reception of the public.
Three key writers serve to illustrate this. David Marshall, for example, describes celebrities as “overtly public individuals” (1997: ix) emphasizing celebrity as the “empowerment of the people to shape the public sphere symbolically” (1997: 7) and discusses the specific forms of celebrity relating to television and film. Chris Rojek calls celebrity the “attribution of glamorous or notorious status to an individual within the public sphere” (2001: 10) which takes place through the “cultural fabrication” of cultural intermediaries (agents, the media etc.) (2001: 10-11) which are “inflected, revised and recast by the direct circumstances and relations of life in which we are located” (2001: 16). Graeme Turner sees celebrity as a “genre of representation and a discursive effect” produced by the publicity and media industries (2004: 7) which is at least to a degree “productively consumed” (2004: 109).
It is also clear that both the public and the media have a heightened fascination and engagement with celebrity: celebrity today is ubiquitous (Rojek, 2001: 185). Celebrity is pervasive across today’s mass media and the role that celebrity plays has expanded through many areas of life (Turner, 2004: 4). There is a strong sense that there is a significant and influential “celebrity culture” the importance and seeming public relevance of which has increased over the last decade at least.
Television has from its inception a track record of a relationship with celebrity, however, prior to television newspapers, magazines and film were involved with celebrity. For example, the “Hollywood system” created a publicity machine to promote individual actors into stars, whose lives became the subject of numerous magazines and were the subject of widespread newspaper reporting from the early part of the twentieth century (see Marshall, 1997: ch.4). Television did not originate celebrity culture, it already was part of the mass media. Television celebrity exists in a symbiotic relationship with celebrities created through other media – and today through the internet.
The particular form of celebrity culture created through television relates to its role of mediating the public sphere to the private sphere – responding to a society increasingly dispersed and physically mobile while at the same time centred on the family home, a home dependant for its upkeep, and thus required to attend to, the latest news and views from the outside world (Williams, 1990: 26). The two features of its location in a domestic context and its near universal saturation means television is “a feature of modern public life that has a place in nearly every private home” (Stokes, 1999: 1).
Television’s “domestic ubiquity” means it is part of ordinary, private and domestic life – an ever present household object, practice and occurrence. This creates the potential for individuals who appear on television to take on some of the attributes provided through the setting and repetitive – and so everyday – mass exposure. The construction of television celebrity operates through notions of familiarity and ordinariness; or as Marshall puts it “television celebrity is configured around conceptions of familiarity” (1997: 119).
A comparison with celebrities of cinema is appropriate here. Stars on the silver screen, have a distance, “star qualities” placed in the firmament far above us – “film celebrity plays with aura through the construction of distance” (Marshall, 1997: 119). This is not to say that stars’ personalities and private lives were not the subject of intense speculation and managed disclosure. However, top Hollywood stars were generally considered as being above everyday concerns both materially and spiritually: they became seen and are often still seen as American royalty (USA Today, 2008). Television celebrities in contrast can have a more workaday and accessible relationship with their audience; for example soap actors are hailed on the street, often by the names of the characters they play, in the same way one might shout to a friend.
As part of domestic everyday life television is also caught up with the politics of the family and morality. There is a sentiment that appearing on television, because the audience is encountered in their own home, is similar to being invited as a guest into people’s homes – whether that is for long-standing television actors, advertisers or for politicians (see for example Flint, 1990; Schmuhl, 2004). Especially when there were few television channels readily available and there was a strong emphasis on the defence of “family values” in politics, there was pressure to conform to conventional norms. There is still regulatory support for these ideas in the form of the 9pm watershed and regulation of balance and decency on television couched in terms of what is currently generally acceptable.
When celebrities break some of the conventions of behaviour on television, this can cause considerable controversy – television celebrities become the focus for a discussion on what is or is not acceptable behaviour. The Jonathan Ross / Russell Brand affair, where the performers caused outrage for behaving badly on radio (stoked by controversy about Ross’s performances on television) illustrates the continued influence of ideas of television’s responsibility to act as a guest in the familial home, but also the partial dissolution of these ideas by the many people who thought their behaviour was merely boyish hijinx (Guardian, 2008).
Increasing numbers of channels allow for a multiplicity of celebrities, the audience for each is smaller and so the celebrities are not perhaps as widely known as previously. Reactions and associations to other than a generic pleasant guest have become possible. Celebrities for all tastes – celebrities that are loved, hated or seen as irrelevant according to taste – have developed. The extent to which this is caused by the active segmented-marketing of cultural agencies or else prompted by varying tastes, associations or even perceived needs of the audience caused by wider social change is an object of academic dispute.
One area covered especially well by television is the creation of short-lived celebrities having in Andy Warhol’s expression their “fifteen minutes of fame”, what Rojek calls “celetoids” (2001:20-23). The sheer amount of airtime and the responsiveness of television to what is new in the world guarantee a churning of transitory individuals that are placed in the public eye for reasons ranging from winning the lottery to being bad at skiing, like Eddie the Eagle.
These celebrities are often cited as examples of the shallowness of celebrity culture. Momentary, accidental or trivial events propel individuals to centre stage rather than “real talent”, often earned over years of effort or else real social standing – even if earned as an accident of birth as with the Royal family. When such individuals do not return quickly to obscurity as, for example, in the case of Jade Goody this becomes further cause for consternation.
A specific television celebrity type is the news anchor. As a presenter this class of celebrity speaks directly to the audience and as interviewer works in front of us and for us to attain understanding. The anchor acts as an anchor, a stabilising presence, or a voice of authority against a backdrop of news – the relaying of events from the public world to the private – that can be unsettling or disturbing (Marshall, 1997: 124). Over time such figures can become icons of respectability, for example Dan Rather in the United States and Trevor McDonald in Britain. Presenters embody a reasoned, rational, controlled response to what can be seen as unwieldy events. This perceived and attributed public authority means that news presenters often have contractual limits put on their political activity.
Another common form of television celebrity is that of the chat show host – here the host often assumes celebrity through repeated association with celebrity guests. Television brings into the home a relaxed, informal discussion where often through humour celebrity guests can let slip elements of their private lives (Marshall, 1997: 125). The familiarity of the host, at once known to all of us and at the same time on a par with the celebrity – can recreate the informal relationship between friends or acquaintances that might naturally bring secrets, indiscretions and otherwise private moments to light. Occasionally a host will joke: “Just between us. No one is watching”. This humour is a way of negotiating the contradiction of a conversation that is at once extremely public and at the same time a private chat open for personal revelations. By sharing the joke with the studio audience (playing the part of the audience at home) we are invited further into the relationship between the host and guest: as friends listening to their conversation.
No contemporary discussion of television celebrity could be considered complete without reference to the development of “reality television” – which over the last decade has become a mainstay of both television output and celebrity culture.
Reality television occurs in a myriad of forms – new versions and hybrid forms of previous types of shows such as documentaries, game shows, talent competitions and makeover shows are innovated continuously. This has made the genre difficult to define and investigate, many dealing at length with the extent to which any claims of reality are justified. What is presented on television is inevitably editorially selected, heavily edited, and often heightened with mood music and set in a dramatic story arc (Brooker, 2007; Brooker, 2009).
However, running throughout reality television is the premise of deploying a number of inexpensive cameras to capture something of raw human responses to unfolding situations, and to have the television audience engage with these reactions. Reality television is about the “tension between performance and authenticity, asking contestants and viewers to look for the “moment of truth”” (Hill, 2002: 324)
Reality television plays a part in celebrity culture through public engagement with the behaviour of people on screen. This behaviour can propel “ordinary people” to celebrity status overnight; but existing celebrities also feature in many shows either hoping to reinvigorate careers or else showing themselves in situations where the audience can get to know more of the “real person”.
It is often the case that reality television is inexpensive compared to traditional forms of television. Compared to drama especially, there is a lack of the need to script, build sets and have actors paid to work through a dramatic narrative. Constant format innovation by television companies is premised on relatively low production costs. This is no doubt a factor in how widespread reality television has become in a multi-channel television environment.
Big Brother, aired from 2000, is an important show in the development of reality television and serves to illustrate some features of the genre. Individuals, plucked from obscurity, have their entire lives placed under the gaze of cameras filling a house isolated from outside influences or prompts. Posed initially as a unique anthropological experiment it featured expert psychologists to guide us through the personal interactions on screen.
Public engagement is heightened through voting for who should stay on the show. Strong audience attachments are often formed to the contestants and debate, both in the press and in the public at large, as to the behaviour and character of the participants is generated. Television’s ability to have both immediacy and show things “as they really happened” forms the basis for establishing a more intimate link with celebrity. The live character of television coupled with telephone voting enables a stronger engagement with the audience.
The British presenter of Big Brother has recently predicted that, after a run of ten years and falling ratings, the show will soon be axed. Over time more extreme measures have been taken to induce a reaction from contestants who now know what to expect – and people with borderline personality disorders introduced to spice things up. The “reality” of reactions has reduced, undermining the premise of the show – this year there will be no live streaming of video from the house to cut costs.
Continued demand for authenticity – for something real to relate to – can be seen in the ITV show Britain’s Got Talent. This follows a traditional talent show format, but with reality television modifications: reactions backstage, interactions with the audience and between the judges are edited in and later in the series television audience voting plays a part. The recent appearance of the dowdy 48-year-old Susan Boyle, a hitherto unknown, was not only praised for its ability, but for her lack of pretension and caring about “putting on a front.” The clip from the show has been viewed on YouTube 186 million times, the singer now internationally famous (Mail Online, 2009).
Television, then has become the location for the extended development of celebrity culture, creating a slew of celebrities – some specific to the medium – and further mediating society’s relationship with existing celebrities. Television, through its characteristics as a medium – familiar, domestic, ubiquitous, interactive and live – becomes the site for a deeper and broader engagement with celebrity and the “active construction of identity in the social world” that it represents (Marshall, 1997: ix).
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References
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