Where in the whirl is Matt Lauer

Mythologies: I offer this brief essay as a Barthian mythology which will be followed in my next entry by a discussion of Roland Barthes' version of semiotics. Since I've never attempted this form, please accept it for what it is, an emulation of one who has greatly influenced my own research.


Matt Lauer, co-host of the Today Show, NBC-TVs AM news & entertainment show which boasts the highest ratings in its time slot, encapsulates the Ideal Male 21st century. Boy next door who made good as measured by impeccable clothing sense, beautiful former-model wife, a serious news reader and a playful soul whose Where in the World is Matt Lauer enlarges him to the status of World Citizen.

As he travels the beauty spots of the world, his back drop is his applauding fans. As metro-sexual New Yorker he's thin & neat but married so clearly, publically hetero-sexual.

He has no sharp edges, no angst and has perfected the news-readers quality of moving from human tragedy to slightly irreverent human interest seamlessly. He offers no opinions.

Unlike Hollywood celebrities, Matt Lauer invites us to share his celebrity status, reassures us when times are bad, and kids around every day whatever else happens.

Continuity, reassurance, success, desirable man, he's both a large public figure and the same as us: Matt Lauer is the fashion statement of American society. He is a norm by which we can measure ourselves and a non-judgemental friend.

Where in the whirl of American life is Matt Lauer? He exists at the circumference binding together a social formation the likes of which is as intensely personal as it is expansively global.