cfp.english.upenn.edu

Wayne Gretzky. Celine Dion. Rick Mercer. David Suzuki. Pierre Trudeau.

The list goes on and goes way back. Celebrity culture in Canada, although vastly under-estimated, continues to be a massive cultural and economic force to be reckoned with and such a reckoning is long overdue. This proposed edited collection seeks to uncover how celebrity operates in Canada when Canadian subjects, institutions, media, audiences and/or industries are involved.

We take as our starting point that Canada has a vexed and viable celebrity culture – one that shares much in common with others in this transnational global economy, but one where markers and signals of “Canadianness” are circulated as having some kind of significance. What do such markers mean and what is their cultural and economic value? Do such claims constitute an autonomous or distinct celebrity culture or have Canadian celebrity industries and institutions been too long tied to non-Canadian cultural economies? What trends might be traced in how celebrity in Canada is produced, disseminated and consumed? And, what can be learned from one-time phenomena like Trudeaumania? How might existing critical theory benefit from the consideration of Canadian case studies?

Submissions might address (but are certainly not limited to):
 CBC and other Canadian Mass Media
 Hockey Culture
 Film, TV, and Music industries in Canada
 Quebecois and French-Canadian Celebrity
 Politics in/of Celebrity and Celebrity Politicians
 Celebrity Agents and Advertisers
 Pre-Mass Media Forms of Fame and Celebrity
 The state of Celebrity Studies in Canada
 Awards & Prize Culture: eg. Honourary Degrees, Halls/Walks of Fame, Order of Canada
 Commemoration Culture: eg. Statues, Plaques, Landmarks, Festivals

Please submit proposals with a brief biographical statement or one page CV to Lorraine York (yorkl@cogeco.ca) and Katja Lee (leek66@mcmaster.ca).

Proposals due July 1st 2012 (1000-1500 words)
Notification of acceptance will follow by August 15th, 2012.
Final Submission due March 1st, 2013 (5,000-8,500 words)