Category Archives: Uncategorized

2) Consider the role of television (as compared to other media devices) in your daily consumption and perception of popular culture, in comparison to that of the presence of television and its implications on the direction of contemporary popular culture in South Korea as suggested by Kim Suk-young in chapter 2

Television plays a significant role in consumption and perception of contemporary popular culture in South Korea, contrasting to western societies consumption of television. Daily consumption of television in my daily life is rare, and perception of popular culture is presented through mediums like smartphones, and laptops. I would argue that most of western culture has turned away from television in favour of other social media devices. Since devices like smartphones are so easily accessible, it provides a quick briefing of pop culture at the click of a button. Although, Korea also has this alternative, television is shown to be a greater medium in directing idol performers and K-pop domestically. In Korea, television still plays a prominent role in Korea’s pop culture. For instance, television is strongly regarded upon for its simplicity and larger screens, allowing for communal viewing. Kim states “command over large screens still distinguish it from more mobile media platforms”(Kim, p.1137), implying televisions distinct difference that propels it over other media devices for TV music shows in Korea. still have a distinct difference t Furthermore, television can display assets like live broadcasting and live voting to its greatest impact, and thus, outmatch other social media devices in Korean Pop culture.

In South Korean pop culture, television is used as a mass distributor of K-pop through live TV music shows. Unlike western television, Korean media utilizes television to distribute their pop culture domestically, engaging fans through live voting and live broadcasting. Western media has cast television shows to the wayside, prominently because of the powerful influence social media devices uphold. For instance, popular western music shows like, America’s top 10 and Fuse’s Top 20 Countdown, as Kim states ‘migrated to cyberspace”(Kim, p.1209). However, shows like Gayo’s Top 10 continue to strive in present day despite its counterparts in western media.Thus the Korean music industry strongly regards television as a powerful medium for distributing their star/idol system. Additionally, Korean Music Shows easily amuse people of all generations through its wide range of performers and music.

A major component of the success of K-pop TV shows are made through its partnership between TV stations and entertainment companies. Kim reveals “Specialists in the field of K-pop tend to agree that the transition was made in part through a strategic partnership between two forces that shape the industry: TV stations and entertainment companies”(Kim, p.1209). As a result of this “strategic partnership”, Korean entertainment companies can avidly promote their idols. Moreover, since TV programs are  longer than short clips you would watch on a smartphone or laptop, TV programs present the benefit for audiences to discover different and unique idol groups that would otherwise go unnoticed. A culmination of these reasons are why contemporary popular culture in South Korea is being directed in an ongoing upward trend.

References:

Kim, Suk-Young. K-pop Live: Fans, Idols, and Multimedia Performance. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018. (1137-1209)

Flinton Yang
#41403924

Discussion #3 Question 2b

We all understand that without fans, there would be no stars — but how much power do fans really have? Discuss the power of a fan/consumer and what this could entail (how much impact do we have)?

The amount of power fans have to Kpop star is enormous.“Selling singles is no way for a pop star to make money these days. Most artists find that touring and merchandise sales are more lucrative.”(Williamson ,2011) We understand that Kpop stars get their income from their agent companies. Therefore, if a group has a huge amount of fans going to their cncerts,the compnay gains a lot of money. However, if a group is not making money for the company, then the group may disband since the company usually wants to make money from these groups.This shows that we can say that Kpop star’s living is based on their fans. In class, we discuss an example that one kpop star says to fans that they are his bread band butter. Basiclly he is saying that fans is the resaon why he can afford to buy rice.

“K-pop fans can make or break a career. “If there is an issue or fans don’t feel they are being respected, they can easily band together and demand action,” Gibson says. “And in the end, where their wallets go, the entertainment companies will follow.”(Tai,2018) “Last year, when Big Bang member T.O.P was charged with marijuana use, he issued a lengthy hand-written letter saying: “I have left an irreparable scar in everyone’s hearts, so I believe I deserve to be punished.””(Tai, 2018)Why is he deserve to be punished? Is it just because the use of marijuanan is illegall in Korea? Not necsssary.People all make mistakes.However, for a Kpop star he needs to have a perfect image for their fans. He is  apologizing to his fans, since fans has the power to break or make a career.

“Sasaeng (사생팬) are alleged fans who try to resort to crazy dangerous methods to get their favorite idol to notice and love them.”(Mizum,2017) These crazy people are also a part of fans. We all know that even if Kpop stars gets pushed or filmed very closely, they cannot fight it back like normal people do.However, if they do fight back to some fans, they will be judged very badly by the fans. In other words, if one person become a kpop star, his public apperance should always be cool and nice to the fans. Therefore, fans has a huge impact on how idols behave in public and idol’s living.

Reference:

1.Tai, C.(2018), ‘The K-pop superfans who can make, and break, musical careers in South Korea’, 11 March,

https://www.scmp.com/culture/music/article/2136573/k-pop-superfans-who-can-make-and-break-musical-careers-south-korea

2.Williamson, L.(2011), ‘The dark side of South Korean pop music’, 15 June,BBCNews,Seoul,https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-13760064

3.Mizum,I.(2017),‘The Dangers for Idols in Feeding into Fan Obsession’, 8 March,

https://medium.com/@isu.mizumi/korean-pop-idols-and-fan-interactions-excerpt-ae14dba949fa

Lei Cao (#34327569)

Discussion #2
Q2: Are American influences still present in Kpop today? If so, how are those influences connected to Korea’s past history with America dating back even to the 1950s or 1960s, and not just the recent past (1990s, 2000s)?
‘The US military is a powerful agent of globalization.’ ‘Korea has been host to the third-largest deployment of US troops, following Germany and Japan. ’(Kane 2006: 8 ) Beyond any doubt, this military presence has played an important role in the historical development of Korean popular music. Tracing back to the 1950s and 1960s, there are many evidence to show that America popular music introduced by the US military has an influence on Kpop, and those influences still present in K-pop today.
The first evidence is that, Shin Joong Hyun, who is believed to be the Godfather of Korean rock, had been inspired a lot by American rock and jazz. His generation was the first to experience American popular culture. At that time, most Korean got to know American popular culture through the broadcast of American Force Korea Network (AFKN) (Kim and Choe, n.d.). The introduction of AFKN to Korea had a huge impact on Korean popular culture. The famous song of Shin (and his band ‘Add Four’), ‘The Lady in the Rain’, was considered one of the very first rock ’n’ roll songs in Korea (Kim and Choe, n.d.).
As for the second evidence, shortly after the Pacific War, local musicians in Korea learned to play the music of their American occupiers in order to make a living (Kim and Choe, n.d.). Competitions were intense, thus these musicians tied really hard to learn the latest trend in American popular music, they also had to learn how to play all kinds of musical instruments in order to keep their job. It was these musicians who later became major players in Korea popular music industry. Therefore it is obvious that American popular culture had a huge impact on K-pop.

Another evidence is the formalization of hiring procedure. Because of the huge amount of US troops deployed in Korea after the war, local musicians brought from America could no longer meet their demand. Therefore, the US military started to hire Korean musicians and the hiring procedure gradually became formalized, and the entertainment agencies, which are responsible for organizing and managing hiring shows, finally came into being (Kim and Choe, n.d.). Even today, there are still plenty of talent shows being held in Korea, I believe those shows belong to the derivatives of hiring shows. From this we can see that the American influences on Kpop are significant, and those influences still present today.
In conclusion, Kpop is greatly influenced by American popular music through US military, even dating back to the 1950s and 1960s.
Reference
Kane, T. (2006), ‘Global U.S. troop deployment, 1950–2005’, 24 May, Heritage Foundation, http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2006/05/ global-us- troop-deployment-1950-2005. Accessed 15 July 2011.

Kim, K. and Choe, Y. (n.d.). The Korean popular culture reader. Duke: Duke University press, 2014. pp.P276-295.

Ziyu Gan

#13674156

South Korea popular music place an important role in their country, it also defines their identity in a way. The success of K-pop encouraged global appeal to South Korea (John, 2012). Therefore, Korean government intent to enhance their soft power by culture export, which is K-pop (John, 2012). However, Korean idols not only shoulder the responsibilities of keeping Korea’s international standing, but also are under the pressure from government, audience, media companies and advertisers of being nationalistic.

One way of Korean pop stars balancing the nationalism and still attracting international audience is that, they don’t show a clear political stand, especially on their international social media platform (like SNS/Instagram). The most commonly appeared in K-pop stars’ social media are: selfies, advertisement of new songs, video of dancing or singing, photos shot at work and so on, but nearly no comments like how they love their country. These daily life posts drag closer their distance with international audience. At the same time, people gradually forget and ignore the fact of nationalism.

Another way of balancing is that Korean stars express their nationalism in the form of advertisement, instead of giving extreme speech. For example, in psy’s music video ‘Korea’, they included a lot of Korean elements, like ancient Korean palace, traditional music and instruments, clothes Hanbok… so that it can attract foreigners to go to their country. This music video is an expression of nationalism, however, it still follows psy’s personal music style, and focused on spreading Korean culture. In another psy’s music ‘I LUV IT’, he widely used foreign elements to relate international audience. All these actions weakened audience’s impression of nationalism, people who dislike nationalism would not realize the nationalistic elements. Meanwhile, they earned good reputation and good impression in Korea.

As I noticed, a lot of Korean songs, especially by idols, have an international version. They sing the songs in a different language (English / Chinese / Japanese) and release in foreign country, they even make a different version of music video. A lot of the times, the international versions have slight changes from the original songs, sensitive lyrics or scenes could be replaced in case of causing discomfort of foreign audience. The lyrics may also be adjusted to cater local people. In addition, a big number of Korean idol groups contain foreign member, this is also a way of getting closer to them. It indicated that Korean pop stars can have a nationalistic image in Korean audience’s heart, but this image is not necessarily shown to international audience, or at least not as much.

Reference

Lie, John. “What is the K in K-pop? South Korean popular music, the culture industry, and national identity.” Korea Observer 43, no. 3 (2012): 339-363.

Ke Dai (#39328159)