Celebrities in a changing world: A critical view from the Vietnamese context

Abstract

This paper aims to provide an analysis of the concept Celebrity set in the context of Vietnam under the influence of globalisation. By using theoretical ideas of Cultural and Critical Studies to dissect how celebrities, especially foreign well-known personas, have been brought into the attention of Vietnamese audiences and how their images impact the everyday life of a developing yet communist country. The acceptance attitude has been going along with the apparent doubt about the possibility of causing cultural homogenisation, which seems to be a threat at the surface level rather than a critical one. Finally, a concept model to help provide an overview of the notion Celebrity is also presented. That tentative model tries to explain the way celebrities are perceived and how we should understand their role in the quotidian life through a critical lens. © Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia, 2019.