William Davie states that news and television programming often gain mass audiences by “beckoning them to enter the public sphere through the door of celebrity glamour” (2001: 355). As a majority of broadcast channels are global in nature, entertainment news provides a “universal
cultural currency” allowing these networks to cash in on the popularity of Hollywood culture (Brooks, 2004: 21a). In the 1980s and 1990s, for instance, global broadcasting of award shows surrounded American movie stars and musicians with “glamour” and “excitement” hence simultaneously establishing them as cultural icons as well as drawing in high ratings (Lasch, 1980: 21). Cashmore (2006: 6) states the common man has a perennial preoccupation with fame and glory thus this coupling of the spectacle of celebrity with the pervasiveness of television induced the “global insatiability of the public’s desire for [entertainment] information” (Miller and Shepherd, 2004).
As aforementioned, the media follow a philosophy of drawing on the “unordinary within the ordinary.” Saturation coverage of the glamorized events of Hollywood hence paved the way for “unordinary” paparazzi coverage which thrives on celebrity scandal and gossip (Cashmore, 2006: 10). Mass media’s focus on celebrity scandal, however, can also be interpreted as a response to the changes in contemporary societies that is growing nihilism and the scarcity of attention.
cultural currency” allowing these networks to cash in on the popularity of Hollywood culture (Brooks, 2004: 21a). In the 1980s and 1990s, for instance, global broadcasting of award shows surrounded American movie stars and musicians with “glamour” and “excitement” hence simultaneously establishing them as cultural icons as well as drawing in high ratings (Lasch, 1980: 21). Cashmore (2006: 6) states the common man has a perennial preoccupation with fame and glory thus this coupling of the spectacle of celebrity with the pervasiveness of television induced the “global insatiability of the public’s desire for [entertainment] information” (Miller and Shepherd, 2004).As aforementioned, the media follow a philosophy of drawing on the “unordinary within the ordinary.” Saturation coverage of the glamorized events of Hollywood hence paved the way for “unordinary” paparazzi coverage which thrives on celebrity scandal and gossip (Cashmore, 2006: 10). Mass media’s focus on celebrity scandal, however, can also be interpreted as a response to the changes in contemporary societies that is growing nihilism and the scarcity of attention.
