How Photographing Models With Books Changed Reading
By Daphne Short
Since its inception in 1984, the Hermes Birkin bag has served as the ultimate symbol of wealth, class, and taste. The Birkin bag is notoriously difficult to acquire, only available for purchase if it is first offered to a loyal client by a trusted sales associate. The bag is not only stylish, but is loaded with cultural significance, implicating its wearer in the restricted circle of other Birkin owners; in other words, those of the uppermost class. Yet, even those welcomed into the elite, like supermodel Kendall Jenner, are opting instead for the lowly paperback as their ideal accessory for its power to communicate true status: the status of intellect. As social media reduces the identity of an individual to their appearance, the physical book can come to remind us that more exists between the neatly packaged, aesthetically curated cover. However, by reading publicly, Jenner brings the niche literary book into mainstream culture, transforming it from a symbol of cultural sophistication into an aesthetic commodity. In turn, she redefines traditional ideas of who engages with literature, expanding the field of literary fiction and causing it to decline in symbolic capital. Ultimately, Jenner’s effect on the perception of literary culture reveals that prestige is not defined by the inherent content of a work, but is socially constructed by the cultural capital of its intended audience.
In May of 2019, paparazzi images of Jenner poolside reading Darcie Wilder’s literally show me a healthy person, circulated the internet, sending the internet into a frenzy. Tabloids and celebrity drama accounts reported on the supermodel, shocked that the reality television star, famous for a controversial Pepsi commercial, had the capacity to consume, and even enjoy literary fiction. With the first photograph going viral on Twitter, more paparazzi were eager to jump on the trend, and, consequently, more images began to circulate. In December of the same year, Jenner–depicted glamorously seated on a yacht looking out at the view, wearing a bright orange bikini–was photographed holding open a copy of Chelsea Hodson’s Tonight I’m Someone Else covered in turquoise sticky notes. Her relaxed position and slouched posture give the image its candidness, while her sticky notes and book’s splayed pages seem all too natural, almost like she is anticipating a camera’s intruding shutter. Against the backdrop of the ocean and her runway-worthy figure, the book becomes an accessory in Jenner’s hands. Next to Kendall Jenner–a celebrity often deemed shallow and superficial for capitalizing off of her family’s empire and physical appearance more than her talent–Hodson’s feminist essay collection about the value of the female body in digital media points a jarring finger at the viewer themself. The book’s cover is bright purple with a simple illustration–eye-catching and elegant– yet its content recounts Hodson’s messy experiences with love and objectification. The literary quality of the book choice is not lost on viewers either. Beyond the tight-knit literary circles that attend to debut authors and new releases, Tonight I’m Someone Else is virtually unknown to the public sphere, working as a niche signifier of her participation in high culture.
In the age of the pervasive image in digital media, where the individual is often flattened to their appearance, the book serves as a powerful tool in the fabrication of self. In sitting on the bow of a yacht off the coast of Miami Beach, Jenner is nearly guaranteed an encounter with paparazzi, though the book allows her some control over her representation. As Jessica Pressman examines in Bookishness, a book’s identity is created through visual signifiers of “literariness.” Despite not being necessary to the act of reading, given the rise of e-readers and digital publications, Pressman notices that the physical book object is still desired (84). She theorizes that the physical presence of books “allows a display of a person’s learning, aspirations and attachments” and that their physicality is a material reflection of their owner’s interiority (62). Unlike the trendiest accessory, which visually implies taste and wealth, the book finds value in its ability to express who its reader truly is.
Where fashion excels in visual expression, creating an impression of how the wearer wishes to be seen, the novel can further represent an individual’s values and beliefs. In Beth Driscoll’s What Readers Do, she finds the reader to be morally implicated by what they are reading since reading is seen as inherently positive compared to “screen-based activities” for two reasons: “first, the expectation that reading will make you a better person, and second, the expectation that readers will make society a better place” ( 92). Driscoll observes that reading is heavily associated with empathy, introspection, and education, a perception that is carried out of the book and over to the individual reader, encoding them as “morally good” (92). As a result, reading in public view intentionally expresses the reader’s alignment with the book’s arguments and social commentary. The books Jenner reads are literary fiction, a style defined by its interest in the human condition and social commentary. Unlike other genre fiction created to entertain, books deemed “literary” are more typically read to learn from, requiring a level of learned literary appreciation to be enjoyed. Yet, when Jenner features this kind of book in her Instagram stories, she proclaims herself, and by extension her audience, a part of this cultural group as well. Returning to Pressman’s point, the moral implications of reading are impossible to claim without the physical presence of a book (and a third party to observe the act of reading). As a result, the book becomes a fetish object for performative self-fashioning: the book becomes a commodity.
Detached from its familiar home on the shelves of independent bookstores, in Jenner’s hands, and on the covers of Teen Vogue, Hodson’s book loses its status as high literary fiction, and its position in literary culture shifts as a result of its new visibility and audience. In Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of “The Field of Cultural Production,” he imagines all producers of culture as agents within the “literary and artistic field” (30), which is described as a “network of objective relations” (37), where each agent defines their position in relation to what similar producers are not ). The two oppositional sides of the field of heteronomous and autonomous production create the main conflict. On the heteronomous pole, a work is created to appeal to a mass audience, and its success is determined by its ability to generate profit or economic capital. Conversely, autonomous producers have more agency over what they create because it is made for a restricted audience and their success is measured in prestige (38). The opposite definitions of success for autonomous and heteronomous producers constitute the key struggle of the field: “the monopoly over artistic legitimacy” (43). Because a work achieves legitimacy differently, the consecration of a work is contingent on its position in the field. Given that each agent’s position is defined by the positions around it, every new work made, or cultural change can cause the field to shift– their position is never permanent. However, Bourdieu never had to account for the strange phenomenon of virality which, as the photograph of Jenner on the Yacht exemplifies, can bring a novel from a niche and into the public eye almost instantly, permanently altering the positioning of both Jenner and her books, repositioning Bourdieu’s entire map with the press of a “Post” button.
Photos of Jenner reading were met by a slew of reporting from fashion media outlets, not to dissect her bathing suits or sunglasses, but her book choices, effectively bringing Hodson’s book to readers of Teen Vogue and The Outline, not just the typical MFA graduate. Jenner, someone without a college degree and a dubious track record with social justice, seems like she would be the antithesis to literary fiction, which she is, for Darcie Wilder, author of literally show me a healthy person, the first book Jenner made viral by reading. In her article for The Outline, Wilder expresses her confusion and slight disdain for Jenner’s reading of her book, which she describes as “cater[ing] towards the social-media-savvy leftist literary creative type in their mid-to-late-20s who [dress] in clean basics, patronize independent bookstores, [read] the Strategist, and is generally aware of the Brooklyn-adjacent creative climate.” Wilder paints a picture of her readership as one that is educated and socially aware – rejecting consumerism and in possession of enough cultural literacy and intellect to seek out and understand her books. Simultaneously, she suggests these readers are people like herself – other writers or MFA graduates – and not superficial models like Jenner, who could not possibly care about literature and culture in the same way that Wilder’s peers do. Her description is riddled with elitism and self-indulgence – she confirms that her novels target people like herself with the credentials to enjoy her work as it is intended. It is their approval that makes this book “literary.” On the inverse, it is the expansion of Wilder’s readership through her novel’s visibility in mass media that causes it to lose symbolic capital.
In distinguishing her cultured audience from Jenner, Wilder demonstrates that the worth of a book is not intrinsic to its content, but is socially constructed through who reads and endorses it. According to Bourdieu, in “The Market of Symbolic Goods,” the restricted field of production is constituted “by breaking from the public of nonproducers, that is, with the non-intellectual fractions of the dominant class” (5). The field of restricted production operates in a closed system where producers make complex work that appeals to other producers. To be successful as an autonomous producer, one must gain the approval of their peers, translating into symbolic capital for their work. However, the insular nature of the restricted field of production means that symbolic capital can only be generated by approval from an exclusive, highly cultured, audience. This exclusivity is often created out of the idea that autonomous art requires a certain level of cultural capital or knowledge and understanding to engage with. Bourdieu explains, “discredit increases as the audience grows and its specific competence declines,” arguing that when the readership of a work grows to include non “literary-minded” folk, it suggests the work does not require an intellectually competent audience to be understood, subsequently reducing its status as “high literature” given its perceived lack of complexity (48). In Wilder’s article, she admits that she writes for the “literary creative type” (The Outline) and acknowledges her relationships with the other authors featured in Jenner’s reading list. Therefore, when Jenner’s own audience, mainly composed of young women, expands Wilder’s readership, the consecration of her work is threatened as it becomes defined by its economic success as opposed to literary merit generated by peer approval.
Although Wilder’s popularity grew from Jenner’s influence, the growing interest demonstrated in mainstream culture towards literary fiction signifies a shift in the way works are legitimized and consumed in the cultural field. In her article, Wilder goes on to explain that her book sold out on Amazon after the photos of Jenner reading her book were published (The Outline). This jump in sales certainly benefited her monetarily, but it also reveals just how insignificant her own efforts as a working artist are to promote her book. She writes, “[if] the means of production is clout, working artists and writers do not own it, and they can rarely obtain it without help from the powerful” (The Outline). “Clout,” in this sense, is the capital bestowed on writers or artists when their work is endorsed publicly by celebrities. This “clout” has seemingly replaced other traditional sources of legitimacy in the publishing world, like peer recognition. As a result, celebrities like Jenner, who are not recognized writers, MFA (or even BA) graduates, or literary critics, can redefine the value of cultural goods just by holding them. Unlike social celebrities like the Kardashian-Jenner family, whose empire was built on the visibility of social media and reality television, working and debut artists often do not have a name or following to rely on, making it even more difficult to cut through the noise of the overpopulated pages of “Bookstagram” and “BookTok.” Despite the instability and unlikeliness of virality, artists must now depend on popular media to gain attention, resulting in a mass push of the field towards commercializing literature in order to become legitimate.
Evident in Wilder’s response, images of Jenner reading are met with skepticism and even anxiety over the future of literary culture. Before the article, Wilder herself responded by retweeting the image of Jenner with the caption “IS THIS FAKE” (quoted British Vogue). In a British Vogue article titled “A High-Brow Book Is Still The Ultimate Celebrity Status Symbol,” journalist Daniel Rodgers highlights the inauthenticity of the book in the hands of high-fashion celebrities. He recalls an image Marc Jacobs posted reading a collection of Cookie Mueller’s short stories, and notes, “the spine of the book was left un-cracked, but that’s not the point.” Later on, he writes the book is only a status symbol when the reader is both “committed to books and looks” because “a well-dressed nerd is not the same as a poorly dressed one” (British Vogue). The immediate reactions to pictures of models reading seem tinged with contempt. Rodgers’ tone is condescending and resentful, as he assumes the celebrity does not care about the literature they read so much as they care who sees them reading it. His description of the “well-dressed nerd” hints at a sort of appropriation of literary culture – a scorn for these supermodels who sweep in and use the work of actual intellectuals with more to care about than their appearance. However, this negative reaction toward the popularity of literature is most often a result of the elitism and classism that Bourdieu privileges.
In The Literary Middlebrow, Driscoll employs Bourdieu’s model of the field of cultural production to understand the often overlooked middle ground – the space of middlebrow cultural consumers neglected by Bourdieu when focusing his attention on the two opposing poles of high (autonomous) and low (heteronomous) cultural production. Driscoll critiques Bourdieu for privileging high culture and over-emphasizing the autonomous pole of production, causing him to overlook the complexities of popular entertainment (17). Driscoll argues that instead of Bourdieu’s binary model of two opposing poles, the market and artistic creation are always intertwined at some level, even if we, and Bourdieu, are reluctant to admit it (17). The desire to distinguish between commercial and highbrow culture becomes clear when cultural events change in the field, as when Jenner brought literary fiction into the view of mainstream media. Driscoll writes, “anxiety over commodification is particularly evident at key moments in the development of literary history,” as with, for example, the introduction of the paperback novel or the influx of books on social media (23). As she outlines, one of the key features of the middlebrow is its relationship to commercial culture, allowing it to become more readily accessible for middle-class consumers. Literature is inherently higher in symbolic capital than forms of digital media because of its perceived exclusivity and higher barriers to entry–like an individual’s capacity to devote hours to reading, their disposition to intellectually challenging activities, and commitment to self-improvement– all of which are significantly related to one’s socio-economic position. When literature’s exclusivity is disrupted by making books easier to purchase and more appealing to mass audiences through commodification, it threatens the symbolic capital of literature, thus reducing the cultural capital of readers on the whole. For that reason, the negative reactions towards Jenner are less a reflection of anxiety towards the future of literary culture and more a symptom of the literary community’s elitist desire to preserve the value of our own cultural capital, and by extension, our social status as intellectuals.
In combination with her involvement in commercial culture, sexism towards Jenner and women who read also plays a significant role in the perception of the books she is photographed with. In an article by Andrea Whittle, “How Kendall Jenner Became the Patron Saint of Alternative Literature,” she investigates the model’s impact on the literary field and finds that “some early press coverage of Jenner’s reading habits contained a whiff of coded sexism, of an American public’s lingering inability to ascribe multidimensionality to women famous for their looks” (W Magazine). The photos of Jenner reading commercialized Hodson and Wilder’s works and brought them to an audience of middle-class, female, popular culture consumers. As Driscoll explains, middlebrow literature is “both female and feminized” because it is consumed predominantly by women and criticized in gendered terms: “The feminization of middlebrow culture is not simply descriptive, but also derogatory” (The Literary Middlebrow, 29). Through Driscoll’s definition of the middlebrow, it becomes clear that high culture is merely a culture that privileges the male, wealthy, and educated consumer. If a novel appeals to upper-class, male academics, it is considered highbrow, but if that same novel becomes popular among women, it loses status and joins the middlebrow. Women make up most of the cultural sector–both as consumers and producers. Publishing houses and bookstores primarily market to women aged eighteen to thirty-five, while women make up approximately two-thirds of students in creative writing graduate programs (Sphar and Young, 151). The dominance of women in the field, especially recently, unsurprisingly coincides with the reduced symbolic capital of literature. In essence, the concern around the loss of status of the novel, as demonstrated in the tone of contempt in responses to Jenner’s reading, reflects a greater anxiety surrounding the influence of women on cultural production.
Like the Birkin Bag, the book’s popularization online may have made it less exclusive, but have succeeded in growing our attention to it – making the Birkin one of the most coveted designer items, and selling out Wilder and Hodson’s books on Amazon. The impact that an image of Jenner reading literary fiction has on the recognition of a novel reveals that symbolic capital is cultivated through exclusionary practices that privilege the opinion of the educated, upper-class, male reader. Although Jenner’s images might feed into the consumer culture she is deeply entrenched in, her platform allows her to partially democratize literary culture, demonstrating that anyone, regardless of background, can participate. As a literary community, we have been crying wolf over the death of the novel for the last hundred years. Still, we mock and scorn the new readers running to the book’s rescue in an effort to preserve the very elitist beliefs that make literature inaccessible in the first place! If we truly believe in the power of literature and reading to teach and unite people across borders and generations, then we must accept and even use the new ways literature is gaining relevance in an increasingly digital world.
Works Cited
Bourdieu, Pierre. The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. Columbia University Press, 1993.
Driscoll, Beth. “The Moral Force of Readers.” Bloomsbury Academic, 2024, pp. 89–114.
Driscoll, Beth. The New Literary Middlebrow: Tastemakers and Reading in the Twenty-First Century. Palgrave Macmillan UK : Imprint : Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.
Pressman, Jessica. Bookishness: Loving Books in a Digital Age. Columbia University Press, 2020.
Rodgers, Daniel. “A High-Brow Book Is Still the Ultimate Celebrity Status Symbol.” British Vogue,, 10 Aug. 2023, www.vogue.co.uk/article/marc-jacobs-kendall-jenner gigi-hadid-books.
Spahr, Juliana, and Stephanie Young. “The Program Era and the Mainly White Room.” After the Program Era: The Past, Present, and Future of Creative Writing in the University, University of Iowa Press, 2017, pp. 137–173.
Whittle, Andrea. “How Kendall Jenner Became the Patron Saint of Alternative Literature.” W Magazine, 17 Dec. 2019, www.wmagazine.com/story/kendall-jenner-reading-habits.
Wilder, Darcie. “How Did Kendall Jenner Get a Copy of My Book, ‘Literally Show Me a Healthy Person’?” The Outline, 14 Nov. 2019, theoutline.com/post/8254/how did-kendall-jenner-get-a-copy-of-my-book-literally-show-me-a-healthy-person.