The Art of Self Invention: Image and Identity in Popular Visual Culture Joanne Finkelstein 9781845113964

Both an exploration of the ways in which we fashion our public identity and a manual of modern sociability, this lively and readable book explores the techniques we use to present ourselves to the world: body language, tone of voice, manners, demeanour, 'personality' and personal style. Drawing on historical commentators from Castiglione to Machiavelli, and from Marcel Mauss to Roland Barthes, Joanne Finkelstein looks to popular visual culture, including Hollywood film and makeover TV, to show how it provides blueprints for the successful construction of 'persona'. She also discusses the role of fashion and of status symbols and how advertising sells these to us in our never ending quest for social mobility. Finkelstein's interest here is not in the veracity of the self - recently dissected by critical theory - but rather in the ways in which we style this 'self', in the enduring appeal of the 'new you' and in our fascination with deception, fraudulent personalities and impostors.

Both an exploration of the ways in which we fashion our public identity and a manual of modern sociability, this book explores the techniques we use to present ourselves to the world: body language, tone of voice, manners, demeanour, 'personality' and personal style.

About the Author
Joanne Finkelstein is Professor and Executive Dean, Faculty of Arts, Ed. & HD, Victoria University, Australia. Her books include 'The Fashioned Self' and 'Slaves of Chic'


Book Information
ISBN 9781845113964
Author Joanne Finkelstein
Format Paperback
Page Count 264
Imprint I.B. Tauris
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing PLC