Rethinking microcelebrity: key points in practice, performance and purpose

ABSTRACT

Since Terri Senft coined the term ‘microcelebrity’ a decade ago, it has become a key focus for studies of digital celebrity, describing both the ‘bottom up’ production practices of potentially billions of ‘ordinary’ people on social networks sites, and a new category for the famous. Through statistical and qualitative examination of the practices and reach of the top 20 ‘digital first talents’ represented by UK-based agency Gleam Futures and then focused analysis of the Instagram accounts of power couple Zoe Sugg and Alfie Deyes, this article offers three key ways we might ‘rethink’ microcelebrity. Firstly, that what began as a ‘prosumer’ activity in the 2000s is now a professionalised and commercialised group production practice and while microcelebrities are portrayed as symbols of individualised emancipation – building fame on their own terms and challenging the cultural hegemony of corporate media – they now work within the mainstream. Secondly, how performances across social media create sophisticated ‘repressive ambiences’ for audiences, which perpetuate consumerism as liberation through deliberately fostering parasociality with audiences and directives to emulate. Finally, how this follows similar ‘networked’ displays of other reality-based celebrities and argues for the inclusion of the term ‘applied’ celebrity as a means to understand their practices, performances and purposes.

KEYWORDS:

• Microcelebrity
• applied celebrity
• professionalised production
• networked reality
• parasociality
• authenticity
• consumerism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The @pbmerch Instagram page has not posted since February 2018 and had just 27 posts since its launch by Gleam Futures in October 2016.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bethany Usher

Dr Bethany Usher leads MA Media and Journalism provision at Newcastle University. She is also a senior journalist who has worked for a number of British newspapers.