Celebrity culture - Wikipedia
Celebrity culture is a high-volume exposure to celebrities' personal lives on a global scale. It is inherently tied to consumer interests where celebrities transform their fame to become product brands.
Whereas a culture can usually be physically identified, and its group characteristics easily observed, celebrity culture exists solely as a collection of individuals' desires for increased celebrity viewing. Celebrities themselves do not form a cohesive and identifiable group with which they identify themselves, but are rather found across a spectrum of activities and communities including acting, politics, fashion, sports and music. This "culture" is created when there is common knowledge within a society that people are interested in celebrities and are willing to alter their own lives to take part in celebrities' lives. The "culture" is first defined by factors outside of celebrities themselves and then augmented by celebrities' involvement within that publicly constructed culture. Celebrity culture has become a part of everyday society and functions as a form of entertainment.[1] Today, everyday citizens play an important role in the perpetuation of celebrity culture by constantly checking the whereabouts of celebrities, their friends, the trends within celebrity culture, and the general lives of celebrity via media.[1] Celebrity culture is now reflected in social norms and values because of the extreme citizen involvement.[2] Today, as it is now used as entertainment, celebrity culture is viewed as a form of "escapism" from reality and a means of preoccupation for everyday people.[3]
Celebrity culture in the United States began in the late nineteenth century as the nouveaux riches sought personal publicity in the society columns and magazines of the day. While philanthropists, politicians, and other public figures were the best-known New Yorkers in the 1870s, by the 1890s, the new elite were people celebrated for their gossip value.[4] Film historian Richard Schickel cites the beginning of the modern celebrity system to the period between 1895 and 1920.[5] In the 1930s and '40s, the modern culture of celebrity was fashioned through the columns of Walter Winchell, America's "most celebrated gossip writer".[4]: 254
