Routledge Companion to Gender and Celebrity

Joanna McIntyre is Senior Lecturer in Media Studies at Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. Her research intersects celebrity studies, trans studies, and queer studies. She is co-editor of Gender and Australian Celebrity Culture (Routledge, 2021), and publishes in leading journals, including Journal of Children and Media, Feminist Media Studies, Celebrity Studies Journal, and The European Journal of Cultural Studies.Anthea Taylor is Associate Professor and Chair of Gender and Cultural Studies at the University of Sydney, Australia. She has published widely in feminist celebrity studies, including the first monograph on celebrity feminism, Celebrity and the Feminist Blockbuster (2016), and most recently Germaine Greer, Celebrity Feminism and the Archive (Routledge, 2025).

• Introduction: Gender and celebrity studies in a post-#MeToo world Joanna McIntyre and Anthea Taylor Part 1: Historicising Celebrity 1. Unseemly affects: gender, celebrity, and the policing of fame hunger Lorraine York 2. Queens of song: opera divas and women’s celebrity in Australia Karen Fox 3. Posthumous celebrity feminism: collective memory, “legacy”, and the obituaries of Betty Friedan and Helen Gurley Brown Anthea Taylor 4. Queer genius: Alison Bechdel’s long-term celebrity Lee Wallace 5. Before “the transgender tipping point”: Miriam Rivera, Nadia Almada, reality TV, and the beginnings of celebrified transnormativity Joanna McIntyre and L.A. Miller Part 2: Manufacturing Celebrity 6. “Reality reckoning”?: feminised cultural labour and the ‘grey zones’ of reality television work Eleanor Kilroy, Helen Wood and Jilly Boyce Kay 7. On (not) becoming the “fairy goddess”: gendered cruel optimism and the affective archive of Chinese (micro)celebrity Li Ziqi Dongyang Li 8. Symbolic interest, and the construction and gatekeeping of celebrity narratives on the awards circuit Robert Boucaut 9. Marilyn Monroe™: authorisation and the problematic politics of star narrative, sex aids, biopics, and borrowed dresses Ellen Wright 10. A celebrity’s resistance against the “civil” social imaginary: the 2021 Pori Moni saga and competing gendered media discourses in Bangladesh Harisur Rahman and Shams Bin Quader 11. Anyone can be Filmmaker Barbie – but especially Margot Robbie: a constellation of women producer/director stars, and collective celebrity field migration in post-#MeToo Hollywood Joanna McIntyre and Liam Burke Part 3: Representing Celebrity 12. (Re)framing Britney Spears: the celebrity bimbo in the #MeToo era Harriet Fletcher 13. The coming-of-age of Amandla Stenberg: navigating bi-racial girl child stardom, Hollywood, and US society Katherine Whitehurst 14. Rendering the Indigenous body legible: Temuera Morrison, celebrity, and Māori masculinities Holly Randall-Moon 15. We need to talk about Kevin: coming out as reputation management in the era of #MeToo Anita Brady 16. From mother to monarch: RuPaul, US universalism, and the rise of a global drag empire Violet Thompson Part 4: Embodying Celebrity 17. “Gray Pride”: feminism, age, embodiment, and the semiotic circuits of celebrity Brenda Weber 18. The child actress in old age: the enduring intertextual influence of The Bad Seed on child star Patty McCormack’s silvering celebrity Craig Martin 19. Celebrity and fatness: crafting an authentic persona between idolisation and marginalisation Lene Bull-Christianson 20. Jamie Dornan: negotiating masculine beauty, actorly craft, and regional authenticity Anthony McIntyre 21. China’s “traffic idol” celebrities and mediated gender online: embodying gender norms while traversing platform fragmentation Li Ye Part 5: Politicising Celebrity 22. Epistemology of a glass closet: Anson Lo’s queer stardom and the politics of ambiguity in the post-ELAB Hong Kong Mei Ting Li 23. “Hollywood’s Mr Politics”: George Clooney, film stardom, and liberal masculinity in post-9/11 USA Joshua Gulam 24. Emerging celebrity feminisms in Spain: the case of Leticia Dolera Abigail Loxham 25. The intellectual celebrity of Jordan Peterson: performing authority, emotions, and masculinity Mikkel Bækby Johansen 26. Digital celebrity feminist activism in Pakistan: analysing Qandeel Baloch and Meesha Shafi Amna Nasir Part 6: Dis/Empowering Celebrity 27. Yass, camp is political! Randy Rainbow’s queer microcelebrity and “sass-veillance” Niall Brennan 28. “A real sharp learning curve”: experiences of going viral and becoming an accidental celebrity feminist Angela Towers 29. Nymphia Wind, imperial drag, and queer sinophone celebrity crossovers Ben Aslinger 30. “I’m so gay”: Kristen Stewart’s adapted tomboyism and feminist reclaiming of visibility Shirley Xue Yang 31. Michelle Yeoh and the ageing discourse of Asian women celebrities Dorothy Lau 32. Gender and the cultural politics of the celebrity selfie Milly Williamson Part 7: Researching Celebrity 33. Anna Ford, “Women in Media” and celebrity/feminism in UK second-wave feminism Hannah Hamad 34. “She was never pretty anyway”: women celebrities and visibilities of ageing Anne Jerslev 35. “Cry only if you’re famous”: celebrity vulnerability and “ordinary” producers on Instagram Rachel Faleatua 36. Interviewing queer television celebrities: methodological and practical reflections Damien John O’Meara 37. #EnginAkyürek: a Turkish actor’s global celebrity and women’s fan labour Carolina Acosta-Alzuru. Index