Content area
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to address celebrity pastors’ image or impression management via apparel, the signified meanings of celebrity pastors’ apparel in media, and media audiences’ perspectives of these communicative visual representations. The theoretical framework is guided by Goffman’s Presentational Self, also referred to as the sociology of impression management, as well as visual communication and semiotics. A star studies research approach, which media and culture researchers employ to examine celebrities, frames this research initiative and includes qualitative methodologies of semiotic analysis, content analysis, textual analysis, and archive research. Interviews with pastors also provide subject matter knowledge. Findings reveal that designer apparel contributes to an impression of pastors as performers and the audience as co-participants in their image management performance through media. Additionally, polysemic meanings are conveyed through celebrity pastors’ designer attire including various demographic and sociological constructions. A critical finding of the analysis is that celebrity pastors, irrespective of race or gender, wearing designer streetwear or sneakers, visually communicate characteristics of Blackness or African American image, masculinity, hip-hop, and popular culture to media consumers which evoke associated viewer responses. This examination adds scholarly and practical insight regarding the celebrity pastor phenomena, perception of their fashion choices, and cultural conveyances to society while further contributing to the developing research areas of image management and fashion scholarship, particularly from the communicative perspective of fashion and the Christian faith.
