ABSTRACT
People can only know about their fellow citizens in the world of the imagination, the written word, images, and sounds conveyed over the mass media, such that a ‘nation-state’ is inherently an ‘imagined community. Celebrity can be understood, writes Goldsmith, ‘as an extensive, industrialized and intertextual mode of gossip, disseminating information, facilitating identifications, channelling desires, defining relations within a community, proscribing behaviours and legitimating values’. Central to the structure of the relationship between celebrities and their audience is the construction of oneself as a ‘fan’, where the relationship with a smaller range of celebrities, often only one, becomes a key aspect of identity and self-formation. Celebrity gossip is a safe and effective way of breaking the conversational ice, whether it be with old friends, casual acquaintances, or strangers, and more generally a central aspect of the public sphere – pubs, workplaces, cafes – alongside private social interaction.
