Two definitions capture the ambivalence of the Socialite quite well one appears pejorative, and the other attempts to gentrify the root of the word. A socialite spends a significant amount of time attending various fashionable social gatherings.”
The octopal Wikipedia is more urbane: it describes a socialite as “a person (usually from a privileged, wealthy, or aristocratic background) who plays a prominent role in high society. “The word socialite implies frivolity: frequent collocates include wealthy and well-bred but also spoiled, pampered, snooty and vapid.” The Macmillan dictionary is even less so: Google is uncharitably brief: “Socialite – /ˈsəʊʃəlʌɪt/ – noun – a person who is well known in fashionable society and is fond of social activities and entertainment.” We believe that irrespective of an individual’s desires to hug fame and be relevant, if he or she does not acquire the privilege of accomplishments and the mindset of a proper celebrity, he or she is merely a Socialite.Īs it was at the beginning, let us tread around the world, with the help of few disparate “definitions” of the Socialite, a word which came into parlance as far back as the 1920s. On many levels, the socialite is seen from the mindset of a wannabe celeb. Today, as we trudge towards what can be described as the greying end of a four-part treatise on authentic celebrity status in an African continuum, we shall focus attention on the elements that delineate the relevance, or otherwise, of the Socialite, as well as the contra-distinctions to the Celebrity, properly so-called. Recall that our operative desire, in this ongoing tetralogy, was fuelled by a realisation that my class of post-graduate students have had to be challenged and engaged using robust debates, assignations, definitions, connotations and anecdotes, in appreciating and exercising editorial decisions on people who should be lionized as leading lights of their society.
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