Professor Geoffrey Craig, Professor of Journalism and Director of Research Centre for Journalism will give a Guest Lecture at BSIS on Wednesday 6 November.
This lecture explores the figure of the celebrity politician. In particular Professor Craig, will discuss the efficacy of political celebrity in the exercise of political leadership where individuals must negotiate the relationship between the media or journalistic field and the political field. Craig argues that there is an ephemerality to political celebrity and it is dependent upon the temporality of political cycles. He also discusses how political celebrity is an unstable phenomenon, partly because it encapsulates a tension between different conceptualisations of subjectivity, where the positing of an autonomous, authentic self competes with a more situational and performative understanding of the self, and that this latter understanding of political celebrity is exacerbated in the contexts of post-broadcast democracy. Craig discusses these points with reference to former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Attendance is free but so that we can monitor numbers, please email bsis@kent.ac.uk to confirm your place.