Given the evident command of the celebrity in 20th- and 21st-century media cultures and following modern trends toward trans-medial and inter-generic production, this traditional session calls for papers that explore the relationships between celebrity and generic scandals. How have filmmakers, television writers, tabloid/entertainment journalists, novelists, essayists, biographers, memoirists, and other cultural creators depicted celebrity scandal while pushing the limits of their given genre or medium? While the 20th and 21st centuries are the focus of this call, media and literary scholars of all periods are welcomed to apply. History-bending is happily encouraged alongside genre-bending. Scandals could involve:
Addiction/alcoholism
Mental illness and “nervous breakdowns”
Sexual controversy: sex tapes, infidelity, coming out, consent, rape, assault, doxing, incest, public sex, etc.
Censorship and privacy
Body image (fatness, thinness)
Crime (shoplifting, violence, DUIs)
Health spectacles: disease, cancer, HIV/AIDS, etc.
Slander
Cults
Please send a 300-word abstract, brief bio, and A/V requirements to Blake Beaver at blake.beaver@duke.edu by June 1, 2020.
