Arthur Knight wrote:
 
>class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, age?  (It's worth
>noting here that, aside from Richard Dyer's two books focussing
>on stars, *Stars* and the underappreciated *Heavenly Bodies*,
>there is considerable feminist work on stars, my current favorite
>being Jackie Stacey's *Star Gazing*.)
...
>For many film viewers (us), they are a big part of the mix
>(i.e., meaning, value, quality, attraction, art, identity).  As
>scholars, I think we find this unnerving for a wide array of
>reasons--performers are powerfully affective without being
>clearly meaningful, the text has no end and isn't even much of a
>text, etc.--but I don't think that means we should (or can)
>avoid studying perfomers/stars... or the people (including us)
>that are fascinated by them.  SO bring on the studies.....
 
Two recent anthologies attempt to bring together essential star
studies (many of which continue Dyer's work):
 
Christine Gledhill, ed., STARDOM:  INDUSTRY OF DESIRE (London/NY:
Routledge, 1991).
 
Butler, Jeremy, ed., STAR TEXTS:  IMAGE AND PERFORMANCE IN FILM AND
TELEVISION (Detroit:  Wayne State University Press, 1991).
 
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Jeremy Butler
mailto:[log in to unmask]
SCREENsite: http://www.sa.ua.edu/SCREENsite/
Telecommunication & Film/University of Alabama/Tuscaloosa
 
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