Loading...
Start Date
25-6-2022 12:00 AM
End Date
25-6-2022 12:00 AM
Abstract
Influenced by the dynamics of consumer capitalism, the symbiotic relationship between legacy media and digital culture enables reimagining the identities of public figures like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ruth Bader Ginsburg as iconic brands. Since being elected to Congress in 2018, Ocasio-Cortez has been proclaimed as a cultural, feminist, political, and fashion icon, with critics applauding her strategic selection of clothing as part of the activism defining her political persona. Following her death in September 2020, editorial commentaries and social media users similarly portrayed Ginsburg as a multilayered icon transcending the institutional boundaries of the Supreme Court. Both figures have entered the imaginary of popular culture through depictions on television programs and documentaries including The Boys, Superstore, On the Basis of Sex, Knock Down the House, and RBG, while also serving as the inspiration for social media content. Through a close textual analysis of select media representations, this paper analyzes the influence of commodity activism in reinventing political figures like Ginsburg and Ocasio-Cortez into iconic brands in media culture. Their privileged status in public discourse results from the power of cultural intermediaries and social media users reinventing their personas as brands symbolic of a form of iconic idealism. Central to the analysis is interrogating the structural co-dependence of legacy media and digital culture that enables these iconic brands to circulate, the politics underlying the iconic ideals of public good and social reform employed to reshape Ginsburg and Ocasio-Cortez’s brand identities, and the possibilities these processes offer for reimagining iconicity that emerges from institutional structures.
REINVENTING PUBLIC PERSONAS INTO ICONS AT THE INTERSECTION OF LEGACY MEDIA AND DIGITAL CULTURE: A STUDY OF ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ AND RUTH BADER GINSBURG
Influenced by the dynamics of consumer capitalism, the symbiotic relationship between legacy media and digital culture enables reimagining the identities of public figures like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ruth Bader Ginsburg as iconic brands. Since being elected to Congress in 2018, Ocasio-Cortez has been proclaimed as a cultural, feminist, political, and fashion icon, with critics applauding her strategic selection of clothing as part of the activism defining her political persona. Following her death in September 2020, editorial commentaries and social media users similarly portrayed Ginsburg as a multilayered icon transcending the institutional boundaries of the Supreme Court. Both figures have entered the imaginary of popular culture through depictions on television programs and documentaries including The Boys, Superstore, On the Basis of Sex, Knock Down the House, and RBG, while also serving as the inspiration for social media content. Through a close textual analysis of select media representations, this paper analyzes the influence of commodity activism in reinventing political figures like Ginsburg and Ocasio-Cortez into iconic brands in media culture. Their privileged status in public discourse results from the power of cultural intermediaries and social media users reinventing their personas as brands symbolic of a form of iconic idealism. Central to the analysis is interrogating the structural co-dependence of legacy media and digital culture that enables these iconic brands to circulate, the politics underlying the iconic ideals of public good and social reform employed to reshape Ginsburg and Ocasio-Cortez’s brand identities, and the possibilities these processes offer for reimagining iconicity that emerges from institutional structures.
Bio
Aidan Moir received her PhD from York University in Communication & Culture. Her research analyzes how discourses of branding shape the circulation of iconic identities in contemporary media culture. Her dissertation, which she is currently adapting into a manuscript, analyzed the symbiotic relationship between legacy media and digital culture in creating the iconic idealism associated with the brand identities of individuals with global impact.