American Idolatry: Celebrity, Commodity and Reality Television

The popular definition characterizes celebrity as a product of manufacture rather than merit. If fame is taken to represent the recognition of achievement, then modern celebrity, in contrast, must be based on something other than achievement, for celebrity and fame are not the same thing.

This book explores the process by which celebrity is created, using the first seven seasons of Fox Television's American Idol as a framework for analysis of how celebrity is defined, generated, nurtured, and intensified.