Moving from People magazine to publicists' offices to tours of stars' homes, Joshua Gamson investigates the larger-than-life terrain of American celebrity culture. In the first major academic work since the early 1940s to seriously analyze the meaning of fame in American life, Gamson begins with the often-heard criticisms that today's heroes have been replaced by pseudoheroes, that notoriety has become detached from merit. He draws on literary and sociological theory, as well as interviews with celebrity-industry workers, to untangle the paradoxical nature of an American popular culture that is both obsessively invested in glamour and fantasy yet also aware of celebrity's transparency and commercialism. Gamson examines the contemporary "dream machine" that publicists, tabloid newspapers, journalists, and TV interviewers use to create semi-fictional icons. He finds that celebrity watchers, for whom spotting celebrities becomes a spectator sport akin to watching football or fireworks, glean their own rewards in a game that turns as often on playing with inauthenticity as on identifying with stars. Gamson also looks at the "celebritization" of politics and the complex questions it poses regarding image and reality. He makes clear that to understand American public culture, we must understand that strange, ubiquitous phenomenon, celebrity.
Lindsay, a former child star who suffered a nervous breakdown after developing the ability to hear what anyone says about her, comes to see this as an asset when, after her father's death, she learns that she is not alone.
"A humorous book, lampooning the cult of celebrity."--Provided by publisher.
In the 1930s, rebellious Vermonters were the first to vote down a major New Deal construction project, the Green Mountain Parkway. Join local historian Dick Smith as he reveals this state's pioneering nature.
This guide contains answers to the exercise questions as well as four sample student responses to the stories. The author has rated the responses and has included the criteria she used to judge the student work.
Claims to Fame: Book 1
Claims to Fame: Fourteen Short Biographies
Our Superlative Pacific Northwest: Unique Claims to Fame
A Claim to Fame
The most infamous of conquerors gets the Horribly Famous treatment.
The Acropolis in Athens has captured the imaginations of readers, writers and travellers for centuries and every year draws crowds from all over the world. One of the world's most...