This article examines the rise of Labubu, an 'ugly-cute' designer toy, as a non-human celebrity among young people and explores how fan practices of sang culture contribute to the establishment of its celebrity status in mainland China. Drawing on textual analysis, discourse analysis of videos, comments, and danmu on the platforms Bilibili, Douyin, and Rednote, this paper argues that Labubu is not just a consumer product but has instead emerged as a toy celebrity comparable to human stars. Its rise has been driven by celebrity endorsements, marketing strategies, and its resonance with sang culture among Chinese youth, while the government's attitude towards this toy celebrity remains notably ambivalent. This research contributes to understanding the complex relationship between toy celebrities, sang culture, youth culture, and state authority in mainland China.
This article examines KissCross, Thailand's first virtual Boys' Love idol duo, who transitioned from webtoon characters to nationally broadcast performers within six months (June to December 2025). Drawing on platform data, social media documentation, and discographic analysis, the article introduces 'curated proximity' to describe intimacy engineered to feel personal whilst systematically filtering biographical exposure. Situating KissCross within the broader landscape of virtual idol production, including Japan's Hatsune Miku and South Korea's PLAVE, the analysis distinguishes between performance-origin virtual idols, whose authenticity emerges through what surfaces during performance, and narrative-origin virtual idols, whose intimacy rests on completed fictional canon. Rather than overturning parasocial relationship theory, curated proximity extends it by identifying a modality in which distance operates not as deficit but as preferred relational structure.
The phenomenon of fame driven by audio is not confined to the digital era. This article examines the rise of audio-driven celebrity in digital media environments, focusing on the case of Xiao John Khan. Drawing on sonic materialism, textual analysis and netnography, it argues that audio as an active agent can generate discursive visibility and produce fame through processes of narration, circulation, and audience engagement. Audio can be understood as capable of attaining celebrity status independently of visual embodiment. The findings suggest a shift from celebrity as embodied visibility to celebrity as a perceptual and discursive event, expanding non-human celebrity studies to include de-visualised media forms.
In 1952, Christine Jorgensen became the first modern trans celebrity when news of her transition caused a media frenzy. But this fame was imposed on her by the pressure of an often hostile media, and radically disrupted the course of her personal and professional life. The insistence of the media in uncovering (and sometimes fabricating) details about Jorgensen's history evokes, in a celebrity studies lens, the fascination with the expos & eacute; as a mechanism for producing truth beneath the surface; at the same time, it forms part of a politics of trans representation that has included not only the selective erasure of gender-diverse people but also their hyper-scrutiny. In this article, I draw on archival data to illustrate how the undercurrents of non-consent inherent to the production of celebrity news selectively shape the possibilities for trans visibility. I argue that the risk of forcible outing that runs through the public lives of gender-diverse people is driven by the intrinsic tension between the logic of the expos & eacute; and the right to autonomy over gender identity; to accommodate the demands of authenticity, trans celebrity news needs to perennially cycle back to the past history of transition to the detriment of the present.
This article explores the viral popularity of Yue opera cross-dressing performer Chen Lijun ((sic)(sic)(sic)) - deemed a 'husbandly sister' ((sic)(sic)(sic)) by her fans - as a distinctive exemplar of trans celebrity culture in post-2020 China. Rather than approaching trans as a fixed identity category, I analyse Chen's transness as a dynamic, mediated process shaped by and embedded within China's 'national-style' ((sic)(sic)) discourse. Through critical readings of Chen's operatic training, stage performances, intimacies with co-stars, social media self-fashioning, and online controversies, I conceptualise her celebrity persona as a generative site for 'transing': one that disrupts and reconfigures binarist assumptions about gender, sexuality, and desire while negotiating carefully with cultural traditions and structural forces. Ultimately, this study reveals how Chen's celebrity images persistently draw on and transcend Chinese-specific social norms, and in doing so, render certain trans representations, embodiments, and relationalities visible and legitimised within mainstream national culture.
This article examines the contemporary discourse of voluntary female celibacy as it emerges at the intersection of dating app fatigue, heteropessimism, and liberal popular feminism. The article situates celebrity narratives within a broader online movement marked by hashtags such as #boysober and #celibacy. It argues that while opting out of heterosexual dating can function as a critique of compulsory heterosexuality, these practices are predominantly framed through individualistic and therapeutic logics aligned with neoliberal feminism. Through an analysis of Julia Fox's media appearances, the article highlights the tension between celibacy as a potentially radical refusal of heteropatriarchal norms and its depoliticization through narratives of self-optimization, productivity, and personal fulfillment. The article further interrogates the role of erotic capital, privilege, and desirability, questioning who can afford to "unchoose" sex and still be celebrated for it. Ultimately, it argues that while popular feminism successfully names structural misogyny in heterosexual relations, it frequently resolves these critiques through individualized solutions that leave systemic power relations intact.
This study presents how the media personalisation of successful transgender sportswomen in Central European countries contributes to building their celebrity status. Although transgender athletes can become celebrities, and their adversity can even elevate their celebrity status, the discussion in the public sphere is polarised. In some cases, this leads to a simplified perception of transgender athletes, especially those succeeding in the female category; hence, the media play an essential role in their acceptance or rejection. By adopting a qualitative framing method, this research examines how online versions of the most-read sports media in Czechia, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia have reported on transgender sportswomen in 2023. The results show that transgender sportswomen were generally framed as a problem by Central European sports media. Additionally, American swimmer Lia Thomas and American cyclist Austin Killips bore the burden of tokenism and were negatively celebrified and made representatives of transgender sportswomen. We argue that this celebrification and identity construction of transgender sportswomen through media, even though prevalently negative, may paradoxically lead towards a more complex perception of transgender participation in sports while following the recorded path towards acceptance of LGB athletes of the past.
To study trans celebrity autobiography from the late 80s to the present in the People's Republic of China, this study focuses on Jin Xing, the most influential trans celebrity in China for the last two decades. Through examining her autobiographical materials, including her memoir, interviews, documentaries, and TV shows, the paper explores the representations of respectable trans femininity in neoliberal postsocialist China. The paper builds its analysis on two fundamental arguments: first, the discursive formation of respectable trans femininity is entangled with the state's transition to the 'postsocialist' era, and second, the tension between neoliberal futurity and socialist residue continues to mediate the nation, shaping the politics of bodies, gender, and sexuality. By examining Jin Xing's self-narratives regarding her identification process, her silence on past queer relationalities, an unconventional portrayal of the supposedly 'post-transition' body, and the forms of dushe ('vicious tongue') femininity in her talk show, the paper concludes that there is a mutual process of both visibilising and invisibilising trans femininity within the neoliberal postsocialist apparatus. It argues against the understanding of transition as linear progression and emphasises the importance of recognising the haunting and backwardness in trans autobiography by considering neoliberal postsocialism as a global condition.
In January 2020, beauty vlogger Nikkie de Jager (better known by her username NikkieTutorials) publicly came out as a trans woman after more than a decade-long career on YouTube during which she passed as a cisgender, heterosexual woman, and under duress of a blackmailer who threatened to leak her 'secret' identity. Far from ending her career, de Jager's disclosure propelled her to greater success in the cut-throat creator economy, increasing her celebrity status. In this article, I argue that de Jager leveraged her coming-out to bolster her performance of authenticity as a microcelebrity, reaffirming and deepening her intimacy with her audience. This dialogic intimacy is central to the performance of microcelebrity. While previous studies have theorised the strategies that creators use to perform microcelebrity, little attention has been paid to the role of the audience in microcelebrity. I argue that microcelebrity is a strategy of performance that is co-constructed with the audience, making it distinct from parasocial relationships.
This article examines the case of Zulma Lobato, a travesti celebrity, to explore how media exploitation in Argentine television intersects with issues of class, gender, and representation. Lobato rose to prominence on 'trash TV' programmes like Hechos y Protagonistas, where her travesti identity and pursuit of fame were coded through sensationalised transphobic framing. This research highlights the systemic inequities faced by celebrities from marginalised communities while also critiquing exploitative commercial network TV in their role of heightening stereotypes for profit. The study situates Lobato within the broader Argentine media landscape, emphasising the linguistic and cultural specificity of the term medi & aacute;ticos, often used in the region to describe celebrities. Thus, this study contributes to de-Westernising celebrity studies by engaging with non-Western epistemologies, centralising the unique dynamics of travesti mediascapes emanating from peripheral media centres. This research highlights the necessity of culturally nuanced approaches to understanding the conflation of gender identity and media exploitation as a way to reclaim agency within oppressive media structures.
This forum explores the transformative interplay between celebrity desire and playful fandom, with particular attention to representations of Black male bodies. It analyses a popular Formula One meme, the 'Lewis Hamilton Thirst Trap Curse,' through the lens of play moods. When Hamilton shares shirtless images, fans engage with them in subversive and playful ways that challenge stereotypical and often problematic narratives surrounding Black bodies, power, and celebrity. Within these fan practices, desire and play momentarily reconfigure objectification into expressions of subjective agency and power, as seen in the creation and circulation of memes. The forum ultimately calls for further investigation into the transformative potential of play within fan-celebrity relationships.
This article explores the public persona of Taiwanese politician and free software developer Audrey Tang, the first trans/gender-diverse national minister in the world. We demonstrate Tang's gender identity trajectory is an integral part of her political radicalness, and that her public persona as a transnational celebrity politician reflects Taiwan's nation branding as an LGBTQ-friendly country. We analyse media representations of Tang and her self-representations in Taiwan's domestic press and English-language press, respectively, in 2016 and 2020. Specifically, we examine the connections and tensions between Tang's gender identity and her celebrified public image as a radical politician in and from Taiwan. Tang's political radicalness is demonstrated by her unique upbringing, activist practices, political landscape of digital democracy, and her trans/gender-diverse identity. However, her gender identity, compared to other facets of her radicalness, is under more public scrutiny and requires more effort from Tang to make sense of on Taiwanese mainstream media. Further, Tang's transnational celebrity image has made her a conspicuous symbol of Taiwan's queer liberalist image, in turn suggesting that her celebrity status is implicated in wider nation-building projects of Taiwan. Through Tang's case, we add much specificity and complexity to the ongoing conversations about celebrity, politics, and transgender/gender diversity.
Against a backdrop of queerphobia, trans and nonbinary public figures contribute to public understanding of trans issues through the proliferation of discourse around them. For trans and nonbinary youth, seeing how trans public figures are treated, and how they respond, shapes their understanding of their own standing in society while pointing to possibilities for resistance, reassurance and agency. Using data from interviews with 10 trans and nonbinary young people aged 14-23, this paper asks how they view the forms of visibility available to trans and nonbinary celebrities, and how these intersect with their own imagined futures and relation to power and visibility. It considers the identificatory desires of trans and nonbinary youth, their use of available cultural resources, their feelings about celebrity trans and nonbinary representations or the lack thereof, and their comprehension of the risks of visibility. This work reinforces the centrality of values of community care to queer experience, and offers theorisations of celebrity suggesting that trans and nonbinary media figures can operate as a form of like-minded community in the absence of in-person support. Identificatory desire emerges as a space of exploration and resistance, as enabled by, and as negotiated with, discourse surrounding queer celebrity.
This article examines the transmedia stardom of Susana Estrada during Spain's Transition to democracy (1975-1982). Moving beyond anecdotal readings of el destape, the study proposes Estrada as a pivotal site for debating the intersections of sexual agency, media scandal, and cultural memory. Through an analysis of her trajectory across film, theatre, music, and the popular press, the article explores how Estrada's public persona was constructed as a "star image" through a constellation of discursive devices. The analysis scrutinizes how Estrada appropriated hypersexualized registers to articulate a disruptive pedagogy of pleasure and a challenge to national-Catholic morality. By revisiting her legal prosecution for public indecency and her strategic use of media exposure-ranging from groundbreaking theatrical performances to iconic political-media moments-the study addresses the unresolved paradox of female sexual freedom: the extent to which autonomy can be reclaimed within systems that profit from the mandate of desirability. Ultimately, this historicization of Estrada's career contributes to contemporary debates on sex-positive feminism and the complexities of celebrity agency in times of political and regulatory shift.
For two decades, JK Rowling was a prestigious global celebrity, the widely adored creator of beloved Harry Potter series and Wizarding World mega-franchise. However, in 2017, Rowling began to promote 'gender critical' transphobic ideology on social media and was consequently pejoratively labelled a trans-exclusionary radical feminist (TERF). This article examines Rowling's momentous shift in celebrity status and expound what we identify as celebrified transphobia. To analyse impacts of Rowling's celebrified transphobia, we follow Stewart and Giles (2019) in using a field migration framework to analyse celebrity status, combining it with audience research. We argue the Wizarding World should be considered a cultural field and, as such, its defining criteria is a constitutive element of Rowling's celebrity status. Examining effects of these criteria intersecting with Rowling's celebrified transphobia, we present qualitative and quantitative analysis of data from an online survey with current and former adult Harry Potter fans (n = 242). This audience research reveals a defining principle of the Wizarding World cultural field is trans/queer inclusivity - despite being founded by a self-described transphobe. Although Rowling's celebrity capital facilitated her field migration into gender politics, we find this transformation significantly depleted her once-elite status in the important cultural field of the Wizarding World.
