What defines a celebrity these days? It used to be how talented and artistic one
individual was and how they used those attributes to entertain or expose towards
a range of people, but now “celebrities” are popping up everywhere as a means
of selling themselves to the media. Maybe intentionally or un-intentionally,
but a “celebrity” is able to be any house-hold name famous or infamous.
Celebrities hide behind a front, a front in which they
compose as they are conscious of the public version of themselves. New media
and the paparazzi create celebrities as a public personality that are exploited
to the world.
New media can be identified as the current online culture
which allows different flows of
messages, media and images to circulate. Through the use of Twittersphere,
Facebook and all social networking sites, celebrity status is more exposed than
ever before. ‘Celebrity culture is
explicitly the extra-textual version of public individuals’ (Marshell, 2012),
meaning that celebrities live in a fabricated world as ‘we’ the audience make
their popularity. And as easily as we give them fame we can take it back at any
time. The power of the media gives celebrities their recognition which is why
celebrities ‘pose and present a mask of the self for public consumption’
(Marshell, 2012).
Within the new media, paparazzi tend to exploit celebrities
in their most individual way. Paparazzi use intercommunication to capture the individual
then exchange through social networks to conduct a movement between the
personal and the highly mediated.
Examples of celebrities expressing ‘normal’ lives can be
seen through resent events such as the nude photos of our dear Prince Harry or
paparazzi capturing the iconic sweet heart Kirsten Stewart cheating on Rob
Patterson.
Events like this are more dramatic because
they are public figures. So why do we put these people on high pedestals? Is it
so when they fail it makes us feel better about our flaws?
References
-
Marshell, D 2012, ‘ALC Globalisation and the
Media Week 8’ , Celebrity and the Public Persona
good point you got there. celebrity becoming a major tool for media to explore and which makes us believes that celebrity is powerful as any other politician. if we looked at the Obama's campaign, they usually use several celebrities to campaign and choose him to become a president. by all means, celebrity become a new module for politician to collect the voters. the voters it self might not really want to choose Obama to be a president instead they see their celebrity idol as Obama's representational campaign.
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