‘We're all Born Naked and the Rest is Drag’: Spectacularization of Core Stigma in RuPaul's Drag Race

Abstract

AbstractHow can organizations capitalize on core stigma through spectacles? In this paper, we adopt a performativity perspective to address this question. Specifically, we analyze how an assemblage of different actors within and around an organization contributes to the spectacularization of stigma and thus brings a new reality into being. In this new reality, rather than stigma being concealed, it is normalized, and the organization capitalizes on it to enhance success. We focus on RuPaul's Drag Race as a stigmatized organization that has built its success through the active spectacularization of its core stigma. In our analyses, we identify three mechanisms (i.e., reiteration of transgressions, awakening of social consciousness, and language modelling) the organization strategically uses to spectacularize the transgressions associated with the social deviance of drag queens. Through these mechanisms, a new reality around the stigma of drag queens is constructed and stigma is normalized. Overall, we contribute to a better understanding of how organizations can capitalize on their core stigma through spectacularization; we also explore the role of audiences in co‐creating organizational realities around stigma.