Fame Attack

Chris Rojek is Professor of Sociology and Culture at Brunel University. His most recent publications include Pop Music, Pop Culture (Polity, 2011), The Labour of Leisure (Sage, 2010), Brit-Myth (Reaktion, 2007), and Frank Sinatra (Polity, 2004). He has also co-authored two books and edited and nine others, including a four volume collection Celebrity (Routledge, 2009).

• Preface: The New Aristocracy of Fame1. Celebrity Super Nova2. The Fame Formula 3. Celebrity and Sickness4. Charisma Gulch5. Exposure Management6. Supply Side Factors in Celebrity Inflation7. Demand Side Factors8. Para-Social Relations9. The Icarus Complex10. Reality TV: The Return of the Fool11. The Sphinx of Celebrity and the Idolatry Fun Fair

In Fame Attack, Chris Rojek makes a powerful argument for recognising the crucial role that celebrity plays in our media culture, as well as the contribution played by the publicity industries in managing that role. Rejecting elite or taste-based dismissals of celebrity, this a brave and nuanced confrontation of the downside of contemporary celebrity as a cultural formation.