The significance of celebrities’ personal possessions for image authentication: the Teresa Teng memorabilia museum

Abstract

In contrast with episodic news about celebrities in the tabloid press, the narrative approach taken in biographical documentaries is better able to construct a coherent identity for a celebrity through telling the story of how they came to be the person they are. Taking two TV documentaries on the life of Asian popular music superstar Teresa Teng as examples, it can be seen that even this form of identity construction may be unreliable as a consequence of the inclusion of various broader narratives that are woven into the personal life story. However, the non-mediated nature of the experience of viewing a celebrity’s personal possessions has the potential to authenticate (or discredit) certain publicly constructed identities and images on account of its similarity to an ‘out-of-face’ encounter. To illustrate, seeing the collection of Teresa Teng’s personal possessions in her memorabilia museum reinforces for the visitor an image of Teng as someone for whom traditional markers of high status were particularly important – an identity somewhat at odds with the popular depiction of her as the sweet, girl-next-door type who shared the sentiments and tastes of millions of ordinary Taiwanese.

KEYWORDS:

• celebrities
• Teresa Teng
• memorabilia
• identity
• narrative

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Such as Korean Masculinities (Jung 2011), East Asian Pop Culture (Chua and Iwabuchi 2008) and Celebrity in China (Edwards and Jeffreys 2010).

2. This figure was provided by staff working at the museum.

3. ‘Endless Words’ (Qianyanwanyu, 千言萬語) featured on the soundtrack to a film released in 1974. Tsuo believes that Teng fully grasped the sorrow and loneliness of the film’s main female character and was able to convey these emotions through the song.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Peter Gilks

Peter Gilks completed his PhD in Asian Studies at The Australian National University in 2011. He is now an assistant professor in the Department of Entertainment Management at I-Shou University, Taiwan. His research interests include popular culture, music marketing, language testing and Buddhism. Current research projects in the area of celebrity studies include the role that English-speaking ability plays in shaping the image of Taiwanese celebrities and the impact of the celebrification of Buddhist leaders.