P. David Marshall

Chair Department of Communication Studies P David Marshall, PhD

The Celebrity Persona Pandemic explores how the construction of a public persona is fetishized in contemporary culture. As social media has progressively led to a greater focus on the production of the self, so this book looks at the most visible versions of persona through figures such as Stephen Colbert, Cate Blachett, and Justin Bieber, as well as fictional characters like Spock and Harry Potter. Ultimately, P. David Marshall closely studies how persona culture shapes our notions of value and significance, and dramatically shifts cultural politics. Forerunners is a thought-in-process series of breakthrough digital works. Written between fresh ideas and finished books, Forerunners draws on scholarly work initiated in notable blogs, social media, conference plenaries, journal articles, and the synergy of academic exchange. This is gray literature publishing: where intense thinking, change, and speculation take place in scholarship.

The Celebrity Persona Pandemic

Graeme Turner

Frances Bonner

The areas of publicity, public relations and promotions have been considered to be on the periphery of the media. Yet this revealing new book demonstrates that they form a fundamental component of the media industries, with the decline of hard news being accompanied by the rise of gossip and celebrity. In addition to making a substantial contribution to our understanding of the cultural function of celebrity, Fame Games outlines how the promotion industry has developed and how celebrity is produced, promoted, and traded within the Australian media. While their analysis will inform academic debates on media practice internationally, the authors have taken the unique step of investigating the workings of the Australian promotion industry from within. Interviews with over 20 publicists, promoters, agents, managers, and magazine editors have provided a wealth of information about the processes through which celebrity in Australia is produced.

Chair Department of Communication Studies P David Marshall, PhD

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