Celesta Atkins: Celesta Atkins is a graduate student in Sociology at the University of Southern California focusing on race and gender and also interested in sexuality and identity formation.
In this text, Joshua Gamson explores what he terms “paradoxes of visibility” in talk shows, beginning by explaining, in the first chapter, his focus on the talk show genre due to their habitual use of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered guests. The rest of the book offers a critical investigation of the history and production processes of talk shows, the debates and conflicts over sexual morality exposed on talk shows, the deconstruction and construction of sex/gender categories in talk shows, the political battles played out on talk shows, and the “implications for the important, dangerous, and necessary changes in the cultural representation of sex and gender difference” (p. 25). The end result is a text that makes one think deeply about talk shows and about issues of representation. Is it better to be seen and sometimes misunderstood and/or exploited, or is it better to stay marginalized and erased from society?
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