Jack Monroe and the cultural politics of the austerity celebrity

This article conceptualises home cook Jack Monroe as an ‘austerity celebrity’, a mediated figure who forged her public persona directly through articulations with austerity culture. Drawing on intertextual analysis of blogs, cookbooks, interviews, speeches and representations across the media, I argue that demonstrates paradox anti-austerity celebrity in becoming economically successful face modern poverty. Monroe’s navigation dual identity activist manifests critique government, middle-class precarity, status mother queer which requires consistent ‘authenticity labour’. In case, this labour is visible constant politicised struggle over terms ‘authenticity’. While unable to manage more complex middle-class, identity, confronts established grounds ‘feckless mothers’, UK tabloid media attempts frame success rags-to-riches style narrative reinforcing hegemonic rhetorics resilience creativity routes overcoming adversity. struggles at work presence how moral imperatives for women offer resourcefully ‘challenges’ cuts, arguably draws attention away from structurally politically motivated.