Abstract
As a public relations faculty member firmly ensconced in the rhetorical tradition, who on more than one occasion has taught a course in rhetoric, my original aim was to review Hasian’s book for faculty teaching rhetoric. However, I’m delighted to examine Hasian’s contributions to courses in rhetoric, public relations, nonprofit communication, and the growing fascination (and study of) entertainment and celebrity public relations. As I write this, Twitter recently sported Katy Perry’s introduction of “The Hillary,” a shoe designed and named for—and modeled by—Hillary Rodham Clinton, in time for Clinton’s reintroduction into the public sphere, where she will focus on “causes she cares about.”
Indeed, Entertainment and/or Celebrity Public Relations, both as specific areas of study and practice, increasingly beckon students at institutions such as the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and Michigan State University, among others, as do courses and webinars with such titles as “Sports and Entertainment Public Relations” and “Increasing Your Brand’s Fan Base.” Students will find much to ponder in Hasian’s book; likewise, passionate students who care about changing the world through work invested in humanitarian causes will be similarly engaged.
Marouf A. Hasian Jr. (PhD, University of Georgia) is a professor of communication at the University of Utah who teaches Communication and the Law, Communication and Social Justice, Persuasion Theory, and Critical Research Methods. He has written 11 books, and his research focuses on critical rhetorical examinations of public, social, and legal controversies; law and rhetoric; critical memory studies; postcolonial studies; and freedom of expression; he frequently writes on international and intercultural communication issues.
Hasian establishes in Chapter 1 the expanding role of celebrity advocacy, and its locus at the intersection of brand marketing, nonprofit/nongovernmental organization (NGO) fundraising and development, and public affairs. He reviews previous scholars’ studies of celebrity advocacy, relating observations about rewards received by celebrities who advocate neoliberal or populist causes compared with the risks of fan alienation that befall those who adopt unpopular causes.
However, this book is not a clear roadmap of strategic approaches to practices of Entertainment or Celebrity Public Relations. Rather, Hasian offers a critical rhetorical examination of highly visible case studies students might debate in class as exemplary, disastrous, or puzzling in either execution and/or outcomes. Case studies in subsequent chapters include Bono and Geldof’s creation of RED and the Band Aid concerts; Madonna’s adoption of children from Malawi; Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin’s book Three Cups of Tea; the Kony 2012 video; reaction to Angelina Jolie’s In the Land of Blood and Honey; visibility of the Armenian Genocide raised by Kim Kardashian’s support; and George Clooney’s activism promoting genocide prevention in the Sudan. Indeed, surprises in the book include insights and criticism on Kardashian’s influence on the international stage in her “celebrity diplomacy” role, as well as Clooney’s expertise on Darfur and his ability to avoid the spotlight and resultant overexposure when necessary to advance his “humanitarian interventionism.” For the most part, however, the increased attention on celebrities’ advocacy efforts benefits their “star” status, rather than the status of those they seek to help.
Hasian is well poised to write a critical review of these cases and prods us to consider: Might the cure proffered by a Western celebrity (the Global North) on behalf of a nation or cause in a poorer country (the Global South) be worse than the disease? Indeed, the book’s title references the challenge of celebrity advocacy: While celebrities raise the visibility of a humanitarian cause, too often their overhyped messages “impoverish” the very causes they seek to promote, as the rhetoric interferes with the work of those on the ground.
Case in point is Hasian’s critique of the Stop Kony Invisible Children’s Campaign in 2012, a campaign students most likely remember blossomed on social media as the “Kony 2012” video went viral (111 million views). Yet ask for details and few will recall that the campaign urged immediate military action to stop Joseph Kony, the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army, a rebel group accused of kidnapping Ugandan children to turn them into child soldiers, even after Kony had left the country.
The campaign was both praised and condemned, but left an indelible prescription for best practices in promoting the spread of a humanitarian cause. Hasian writes, . . . though some would dismiss this work as an example of ineffectual clicktivism that did little to help the people of northern Uganda, others defended Kony 2012 as a heuristic example of . . . imaging that would appeal to 21st-century youngsters who had no interest in traditional types of pickets, boycotts, or marches . . . (pp. 123-124)
Hasian’s critique of the campaign centers on his thesis that “Russell and many of his supporters use Kony 2012 as a way of expressing American exceptionalist views of foreign interventionism, and they offer evidence that the U.S. president’s viewing of the video helped ensure that hundreds more U.S. soldiers stayed on the ground in pursuit of Joseph Kony” (p. 124). He cites one Ugandan community health leader who observed that “the video can cause us more problem than help us. . .Now we have peace, people are back in their homes, they are planting their fields, they are starting their businesses. That is what people should help us with” (p. 137).
Indeed, Hasian voices concern throughout the text about “militarized celebrity advocacy” (the urging of U.S. military intervention), and this becomes a drumbeat throughout the book. “It is incumbent on critical cultural scholars to demystify these types of efforts that can create ‘new’ celebrities like Russell and that confuse diplomatic contenders with pretenders” (p. 142). He asserts the chapters “put on display the ways celebrities reflect and refract what large segments of populations want to accept as neoliberal humanitarianism” (p. 260) but may be restatements of military leaders’ promptings. In future work, Hasian urges scholars to avoid two extremes of unquestioning adoption of celebrity rhetoric or the dismissal of the rhetorical power of celebrities. Too, he urges attention on the sustainable humanitarianism, that would supplement messages of the Western “savior complex” with “constructive alternatives” (p. 260) and study of the affective dimensions and sentiments in celebrity persuasion (citing Lousley, p. 261).
For public relations students and faculty, Hasian’s text is an excellent supplement to upper level and graduate Case Study and Theory courses, as it applies rhetorical methods in the evaluation of these campaigns. Indeed, the book demonstrates the value of an interpretive perspective as it sheds light on issues of race, gender, class, and exploitation often overlooked in the “assumptions made by celebrities and fans” (p. 26) in advocacy, diplomacy, and dialogue over complex issues.
And, while faculty and scholars have urged incorporation of rhetorical perspectives into public relations scholarship and curriculum for decades (Crable & Vibbert, 1985; Elwood, 1995; Heath, Toth, & Waymer, 2009; L’Etang, 2006; Toth, 1992), relatively few texts with a sustained single-voice approach exist; those I have found typically are a collection of case studies written by different authors. Hasian’s single voice throughout the chapters consistently demonstrates an approach to rhetorical critical theory that helps educate readers about the criticism itself, even as it reveals insights about long-term versus short-term impacts of using celebrities to draw attention to humanitarian causes. While, at times, repeated assertions of the evils of “philanthrocapitalism” can be discouraging, in the conclusion Hasian offers guidelines for an improved humanitarian campaign.
A few caveats for the public relations faculty member who teaches from a pragmatic, practice-oriented pedagogical perspective are as follows. First, I recommend a brush up with rhetorical theory, going beyond the classical approaches often advocated by some of our esteemed colleagues. Hasian’s work is grounded in contemporary, postmodernist rhetorical theory, and he adopts a range of critical methods, as Kenneth Burke suggests, “use all that is there to use.” This includes ideographic and narrative criticism, poststructuralist discourse analysis, and a Foucauldian deconstruction of dispositifs, examining the symbolic and material fragments that surround these campaigns. This leads to my second recommendation: Faculty may also want a refresher on rhetorical critical research methods to share with students prior to reading, as the author doesn’t cover these in depth. For these reasons I have recommended the text to colleagues in Philosophy, Critical Cultural Communication, and International Studies with background in Rhetoric. Regardless, I believe public relations students are ready for such a text, as it helps clarify the role of rhetorical theory in the evaluative dimension of a campaign beyond the return on investment (ROI), forcing students to think about their proclivity to “compassionate consumption” and heightened media attention, as well as the commodification of a culture on behalf of a cause. If for no other reason, I recommend this book (again, for upper level students and graduate students) due to the rich detail of each case, and the resulting discussions it will generate in the classroom.