Jones, Meredith

Dr., Director of the Institute for Communities and Society,
Brunel University London (UK)

Some members of the Kardashian family have come to be understood as having redefined understandings of mainstream beauty. They may indeed have led the development of a new form of beauty. Their curvaceous, ‘slim-thick’ bodies, their cosmetic surgeries, their workouts and diets, their ‘glam’, and their clothes, have been scrutinised and analysed since their first television show aired in 2007. Once outliers in terms of beauty standards, members of this family are now the most famous representatives of a new aesthetic of mainstream global beauty. This paper explains the physical metamorphoses and media representations of some of the Kardashians, focusing on black appropriation as well as colour blindness. I explain how they have come to both shape and embody a reinvigorated North American ideal form of feminine citizenship that prioritises consumption and purchase of beauty products and luxury services above all else. Performances of femininity through beauty practices and presentations of body-as-image are analysed in line with the Kardashians’ embodiments of ontemporary North American citizenship, including the ways that their often-overlooked Christianity is now coming to the fore.