2024/11/18 by Jordan Foster, Michelle Maroto · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Social and Cultural Dynamics
paper · doi:10.1080/00380253.2024.2421811
Mainstream media reports on the rise of “nepo babies” have brought renewed attention to the advantages that famous and well-connected parents can provide. Drawing from a sample of 331 in-print and online articles, we apply a cultural frame analysis to study news media discourse around nepotism with a focus on how celebrity children are represented and whether these representations support or refute an ideology of meritocracy. We find that nepotism is often framed in one of four ways. First, and most commonly, nepotism among celebrity children is rendered defensible through allusions to hard work and sensationalized accounts of celebrities’ lives and lifestyles. Second, nepotism is objected to for the uneven privileges that celebrity parentage can provide. Third, a minority of articles contextualize privilege and produce order. The remaining frames presented a degree of indifference, which functioned to normalize nepotism. Together, most frames reinforce the American ideology of meritocracy, suggesting that hard work and talent explain the success of celebrity children, while hiding structural inequalities and the insidiousness of privilege from view.