When the Fans Know You're Faking It: Performing Authenticity for Skeptical Audiences

• In Event: Production of Culture Perspectives

Abstract

Sociologists describe how producers convince tactful audiences to buy into or co-produce their performances of authenticity. However, this model fails to account for contexts where disruptive consumers are aware of and challenge performers’ deception. Drawing from ethnographic research at a professional wrestling school, I introduce reality work: a form of authenticity work that arises when producers confront antagonistic audiences.
While traditional accounts of authenticity work suggest that producers stabilize interactions through effortless self-presentation and carefully concealed deception, reality work generates ambiguity and disbelief through exaggerated, semi-transparent performances of risk and physical sacrifice. Unlike traditional performers who hide artificiality, wrestlers strategically expose the performative nature of their actions. They employ selling to incite emotional engagement, embodied anchoring to prove their legitimacy and exceptionality, and curtain-pulling to induce intrigue and speculation.
Rather than cultivating a clear sense of belief, reality work manufactures doubt about what is real or fake. Producers then convert this uncertainty into deepened investment. I argue that this framework extends to a growing number of producers operating in realms where audiences are savvy and skeptical, including influencers, AI-generated content creators, and politicians.

Author

• Anthony Shu, University of California-Los Angeles