In focus: the CNR reviewed

My younger sister is a junior in high school and has recently begun encountering the “what are your future plans” refrain left and right. She doesn’t yet know what her life plans are, let alone where she’ll be applying to college. Instead of playing along — which is so not her — my sister, with the flash of a self-assured smile, will tell any unwitting asker, “Oh, I’m not quite sure what schools I’m looking at, but I’d really like to be a CNR.”

This is — without any exceptions — received with a blank stare as the hearer searches for the meaning: “Certified Nursing ... “; “Clinical Neurological ...”’; “Corporate ... “ Ultimately, nothing comes to mind, and my sister saves them from their panic of appearing uninformed. “ A Celebrity for No Reason,” she’ll say with a flick of the hair.

Since my sister first debuted this intention over the summer, I have responded as any supportive, loving older sibling might: I have worked to better recognize the oft-overlooked subtleties of the field of CNRs. With this knowledge, my aim now is to publicize the history and most prominent names in the field, so that her future conversations can be more congratulatory and less questioning in nature.

Before beginning, I would like to address a matter of nomenclature. It is often assumed from the hyperbolic term “for no reason,” that these figures reach their celebrated status for literally no reason. This is, of course, not the case, as we can see in numerous examples. Many so-called CNRs are merely identified as such because of the disconnect between the event that brought them into the public eye and the immense attention and self-branding we see developing thereafter.

With a brief foray into the history of the CNR and we can better understand the complex nature of this term.

First, we have the “celebutante.” Coined in 1939, this term is formally a portmanteau of the words celebrity and debutante — a pun on the way in which the CNR of this pedigree is launched into society at the hand of their parent’s wealth and, often, a not-dapper but under-clad gentleman. Extending this relationship to the modern CNR, we may begin to conceive of the CNR equivalent to the cotillion process as the now popular nude picture, sex tape or familial scandal.

Today, when we think celebutante, Nicole Richie and Paris Hilton come to mind, CNRs well known within our generation. No one is ever quite sure how the two were first launched into the pages of People (or more frequently, The Inquirer), but from “The Simple Life” to PerezHilton.Com, it is clear that these two women have clearly had a defining and lasting impact on pop culture — an astouning feat, having contributed little more than “1 Night in Paris” to earn the spot.

Spinning off from “The Simple Life,” we get a whole slew of reality television stars that have achieved the stature of CNR. Here, we have a useful example of the nuance in the nomenclature. These individuals are screened, selected and mercilessly advertised by television networks. But the disproportionate success that some of them are able to realize, and the extreme branding and personalized attention they are able to bring to themselves, is more readily identified as “for no reason.” There is no better example of such an individual than Kim Kardashian, and the whole Kardashian brood, for that matter.

While reality television has launched many a CNR, with the rise of social media, we move away from the traditional CNR pattern to the introduction of self-made CNRs. These self-mades jolt into the public eye without so much as a Celebutante Ball or wardrobe malfunction.

Among the self-made CNRs, Courtney Stodden comes to the fore as an ideal model. Courtney self identifies as a 17-year-old recording artist, singer/songwriter, actress and model. However, it is not for these talents that she is known to the greater public. When she was 16, her fame was established by marrying a 51-year-old man (not without her mother’s signature; she was too young to legally file for a marriage license). Since then, she has maintained public attention through the daily upkeep of what is simultaneously the greatest and worst Twitter feed you will ever read. Though she only joined in July of this year, she currently has 72,606 followers.

And so, we can see that the field of CNRs has made great leaps in terms of accessibility — what had previously been a rather elite calling is now an egalitarian field in which it doesn’t matter what background one has. Furthermore, the “no reason” misidentifies what is clearly a lofty pursuit, and one that requires an ability to manipulate media and a willingness to bare all of one’s most private thoughts and parts.

I know not why my grandmother is so worried. It’s not as if my sister has picked some dead-end path. She clearly has her work cut out for her and I can only hope that my grandmother, and the greater academic community, will now begin to give that path the recognition it deserves.