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Reality Shows and Celebrity Politics: a Fast Track for Novice Politicians?

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A Genre Approach to Celebrity Politics

Abstract

In the previous chapter, I explored the agency of celetoid victims and the transformation of public grief and victimhood status into political power. In this chapter I discuss the participation of ‘common people’ in television reality shows as a platform for launching a career in politics. Focusing on the case of Jean Wyllys, the winner of Big Brother Brazil in 2005, who was elected in 2010 as a Federal Deputy representing the State of Rio de Janeiro, I examine Wyllys’s successful conversion of intense and short-term media exposure into real political capital. Without ignoring the justified criticism of the exploitative nature of reality shows and the cultural values the genre promotes, in this section I wish to highlight the complex and sometimes unforeseen conditions that allow the rare emergence of a political actor with some degree of autonomy from the well-oiled media entertainment production system.

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Notes

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Tel Aviv University, Israel

    Nahuel Ribke

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  1. Nahuel Ribke
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© 2015 Nahuel Ribke

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Ribke, N. (2015). Reality Shows and Celebrity Politics: a Fast Track for Novice Politicians?. In: A Genre Approach to Celebrity Politics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137409393_9

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