This Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Lecture is sponsored by the UW-Madison Religious Studies Program and Phi Beta Kappa and co-sponsored by the Center for the Humanities. More information is available here.
This talk uses celebrity to think about political power, applying the lens of religious studies to celebrity narratives in popular culture. It explains how any analysts of American politics need to understand, among many other politically consequential facts, what Kanye West is saying and why Madison Cawthorn’s marriage matters. Thinking about celebrity allows us to consider how individuals may deploy their stories to purposes bigger than mere ratings, how popularity is a resource to be molded as much as it is chased. Popularity can alter the social situation where it transpires; studying celebrity culture can help us to see how the world may be influenced within and beyond elections.
Kathryn Lofton is the Lex Hixon Professor of Religious Studies and American Studies and Professor of History and Divinity at Yale University.
