Celebrity and Mediated Social Connections is a critical examination of the multiple realities of the mediated culture we traverse, extending from our imaginary inner worlds to the imagined communities of digital media. Chapters explore the dialogic at work when we connect with celebrities and internalize aspects of their personas due to the various social roles they serve within our everyday lives. What might begin as strong identification and internalization within our imaginary worlds, in this digital age, sometimes seeps out as we connect to celebrities, their fans, friends and followers in ways that were not formerly possible. The book contains topics that range from the degradation of micro-celebrities, the role of celebrities in promoting prescription drugs and their role in contemporary social movements. The common thread that runs through the book presents a mediated world that paradoxically allows if not encourages people to daydream, engage in stream of consciousness thinking and fantasize about celebrities, all while concurrently compelling us to engage in a digitally based objective world. The possibility of interaction on and through digital media intensifies the emotional connection between celebrity and fan. The more personal details one gives up, the closer we feel we become—digital intimacy based on the excessive self. Digital media entice us to engage and remain tethered to technology, staying continuously connected so as not to miss the latest post or meme. To suggest we should build a proverbial wall between the two—imaginary and objective worlds—runs counter to the reality of an always on, always connected culture in which we presently live.

Performing Media Activism in the Digital Age breaks new ground by conceptualizing activism as a performance extending beyond public space and the moment of public gatherings to consider the more extended view of social or political movements as mediated social connections. The book utilizes primary data extracted from social media platforms by applying a social network analysis (SNA) approach to the people, organizations, and media that are trying to advance their particular agendas, with an eye toward a better understanding of the ways in which social movements operate in a networked society. The goal of social network analysis is to identify social structures within a movement such as communities or clusters and it seeks to locate influence within those structures. Social network analysis as applied to media activism represents an interdisciplinary field that encompasses social psychology, sociology, as well as graph theory, which should suggest this book will be of interest to scholars and students in these and related fields. In the digital age, social network analysis represents a paradigm shift as analytical and data visualization tools can be applied in an interdisciplinary manner. By combining data science and sociology or cultural anthropology, one has the means to visualize networks of individuals and organizations engaged in a social movement, to see how movements are organized (structured) into communities, clusters, and niches, and to visualize power structures within social movements to see who is influencing a network over extended periods of time.

‘Presumed intimacy’ refers to a relationship that requires instant trust, confidence, disclosure and the recognition of vulnerability. Chris Rojek investigates the impact of relationships of ‘presumed intimacy’, where audiences form strong identifications with mediated others, whether they be celebrities, political personae or online friends. Arguing that the way the media are able to manage these relationships is a significant aspect of their power structure, the core of the book is an investigation into the complicity of the media in encouraging presumed intimacy and the cultural, social and political consequences arising from this. Beyond this, it examines how intimacy is performed as a masquerade in many social settings – the scripts we follow in social settings that try to manufacture a shortcut to intimacy. A compelling look into mediated relationships in the network society, Presumed Intimacy will be a key contribution to the critical analysis of society, media and culture.

It is a truism to suggest that celebrity pervades all areas of life today. The growth and expansion of celebrity culture in recent years has been accompanied by an explosion of studies of the social function of celebrity and investigations into the fascination of specific celebrities. And yet fundamental questions about what the system of celebrity means for our society have yet to be resolved: Is celebrity a democratization of fame or a powerful hierarchy built on exclusion? Is celebrity created through public demand or is it manufactured? Is the growth of celebrity a harmful dumbing down of culture or an expansion of the public sphere? Why has celebrity come to have such prominence in today’s expanding media? Milly Williamson unpacks these questions for students and researchers alike, re-examining some of the accepted explanations for celebrity culture. The book questions assumptions about the inevitability of the growth of celebrity culture, instead explaining how environments were created in which celebrity output flourished. It provides a compelling new history of the development of celebrity (both long-term and recent) which highlights the relationship between the economic function of celebrity in various media and entertainment industries and its changing social meanings and patterns of consumption.

Simultaneously celebrated and denigrated, celebrities represent not only the embodiment of success, but also the ultimate construction of false value. Celebrity and Power questions the impulse to become embroiled with the construction and collapse of the famous, exploring the concept of the new public intimacy: a product of social media in which celebrities from Lady Gaga to Barack Obama are expected to continuously campaign for audiences in new ways. In a new Introduction for this edition, P. David Marshall investigates the viewing public’s desire to associate with celebrity and addresses the explosion of instant access to celebrity culture, bringing famous people and their admirers closer than ever before.

This book examines contemporary celebrity culture with an emphasis on how young celebrities are manufactured, how fan communities are cultivated, and how young audiences consume and aspire to fame.