Special issue of Celebrity Studies
Audiences for Celebrity
Edited by Martin Barker, Su Holmes and Sarah Ralph
The study of audiences for celebrities and stars has developed spasmodically. Apart from important early studies by Stacey (1994) and Kuhn (2002), and from a different angle Gamson (1994) Barbas (2001) and Allen and Mendick (2012), and a variety of marketing-derived studies, there has been only a scatter of works concretely addressing how distinct audiences engage with celebrities, and how those engagements become meaningful within their broader lives. For this Special Issue we hope to gather essays embodying a range of kinds of research in both audience and reception studies traditions. We invite proposals for papers to appear in a special issue of Celebrity Studies exploring how audiences engage (positively or negatively) with celebrity figures and culture. Proposals may address (but are not limited to) the following topics:
- Studies of audiences for particular stars/ celebrities (from a range of different media forms, including film, TV, popular music, literature, sport, internet, social media, theatre, opera etc…)
- Studies of online fan cultures, or users of a particular media form
- Historical/ archival studies of audience engagements with celebrities/ stars
- Discussions of methodological issues in the study of celebrity/ star audiences
- Studies of celebrity/ star controversies or spectacular moments and audience responses
Please submit an extended abstract of 500 words (outlining the topic, methods, audience or reception materials used, and contribution to Celebrity Studies and Audience Studies) to susan.holmes@uea.ac.uk, by Friday 1st November. Please also include a brief biographical note of 4-5 lines. We plan to complete evaluation of abstracts by the end of November. Those accepted will be asked to submit completed essays, to a maximum of 8,000 words, by the end of June 2014.
The Fan Studies Network 
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