Think that university is all about Karl Marx, Karl Jung and that bloke Matt you had sex with during freshers week and spent the rest of uni trying to avoid? Well you’re wrong, these days universities aren’t just teaching the classics. Unless by classics you mean modern celebrity theory.
Rutgers University, which is one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in America, has just admitted the first students to its new course Feminists Perspectives: Politicising Beyoncé as part of their women and gender studies course. And Skidmore College, which is a liberal arts uni in New York state, is now offering a course on the sociology of Miley Cyrus. And it’s not just those kooky yanks at it again, this week the University of London held a Celebrity Studies Conference that aimed to analyse the role celebrities play in the modern world.
This might all seem like a sign that nothing is sacred any more and the whole world has finally collapsed in on itself, but some leading academics are actually backing the influx of celebrity studies. Professor James Bennett at Royal Holloway University of London said: ‘From Angelina Jolie’s breast cancer surgery, to Madonna adopting children from Malawi, celebrities are constantly used to tell stories that spark important conversations and debates about moral, political, economic and cultural issues.
‘Today’s teenagers benefit from discussing these topics with their peers. Indeed, we shouldn’t patronise young people by assuming they are sucked into celebrity culture. They understand the difference between reality TV stars and politicians – but more importantly, they understand how both can use PR machines and the trappings of celebrity to boost their popularity.’
We think he has a point – some people consider celebrities like Kim Kardashian as physical manifestations of everything that’s wrong on in the world, but you can't deny their cultural importance in our lives today. It might be depressing, but these days celebrities command more column inches and incite more debate than the economy, politics and religion combined and academically ignoring their social impact would be like ignoring an enormous, botoxed (sometimes slightly vapid) elephant in the room. And plenty of celebs are capable of sparking a debate far more effectively than most politicians. When Kim Kardashian blogged about re-evaluating racism now she has a mixed-raced daughter, she launched a broad conversation around the intricacies of having a child that’s a different race than you. You may not like her, but that’s an important discussion. And we don’t need to remind you that Russell Brand was able, with one interview, to do more to politically engage young people than any politician has done in years. Yes he was engaging them NOT to vote, but he got us all talking didn’t he?
Professor James Bennett is right, we shouldn’t patronise teenagers and university students who want to consider the social implications of the biggest cultural force of our time. If we assume that by studying celebrity culture they’re instantly going to get sucked in to it, then we have a bigger problem on our hands.
Follow Sophie on Twitter @sophiecullinane
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.