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LiteratureReview.docxLiterature Review
INTRODUCTION
The Korean Wave (Hallyu) is a collective term used to refer to the phenomenal growth is Korean culture and popular culture which encompasses of music, Korean cuisine, movies online games and many more (Martin Roll, 2018). The term Korean Wave was originally used by Chinese media in the 1990s. The popularity of the Korean culture was after China and Korea had entered into diplomatic, this can be seen as a steppingstone for Korea because they then managed to spread their culture not only in Asia but to other parts of the world. Comment by [email protected]: Mention why you decided to do the Korean WaveTrying to make people see that other than the Westernized culture there is also the Korean culture Comment by [email protected]:
The spread of the Korean Wave was due to a number of factors including lifting the ban on foreign travel to local Koreans, banning the censorship laws, restructuring of Korean chaebols and many more (Martin Roll, 2018). This paper will give further information on how these factors contributed to the growth. Like any other phenomena, Korean Wave does have its impacts/effect to-date that this paper will explain.
Although the initial spread of the Korean wave was in China, it began to immensely spread around the globe. For example, the French press Le Monde began to have headlines like “Korean Wave Reaches Europe”, this was soon after the two-day concert in Paris took place sweeping the audience away (Pao-Li Chang & Hyojung Lee, 2017). Soon after the Americas also published the headline “Korean Wave of pop culture sweeps across Asia”, indeed this was true because it saw the appearance and rise of the K-pop song Gangnam style which was released in July 2012. This song began to move up to the top song on most of the music charts around the world including, Australia, Canada, UK, USA, Denmark, etc. (Martin Roll, Jan 2018)
Although the Korean wave was initially not as successful in the Middle East because some of the content violated the Islamic values and culture (Suwan Kim: 261).Through cross-cultural analysis Hallyu managed to get to the Middle East audience because they began to broadcast Korean dramas that aligned to the Middle East culture and values.
The Korean Wave also did spread to greater parts of the Middle East during the second wave experienced in 2012. The second Korean Wave brought South Korean pop culture into the spotlight in the Middle East, which in return has increased the overseas impact of broader Korean culture, people, and business (Suwan Kim,2012). The Korean Wave has enhanced Middle Easterners familiarity with the country and South Korea’s public image, leading to increasing interest in visiting South Korea. The by-product of South Korean drama and K-pop has been the promotion of Korean language, food, cultural products, and tourism among Middle Easterners (Donya Saberi,2018).
However, as much as the Korean Wave has grown and implicated a positive phenomenon leading to a globalized culture, there are scholars that dispute that. According to Yonden Lhatto, the Korean Wave is much more of an infectious disease rather than a cultural export. He based this on a tragic suicide of a young entertainer who was a part of the Korean Wave. He goes further to say that the so called “Korean Wave” is an affliction that the world can do better off without. In my understanding he is trying to put across the point that if the Korean Wave was non-existent the suicide would not have happened. The suicide was because the young man (Jonghyun, stage name) was facing pressure from the media and somehow felt lonely (South China Morning Post, Yonden Lhatoo, 2017).
Eyebrows were also raised when a Korean actors Kim and Jun appeared in a Chinese bottled commercial, this brought a nationalism clash and many fans began to question the whole purpose of the Korean Wave (Olga Fedorenko, 2017). The two articles raise a question as to whether celebrities as seen as just commodities or bringing the world together through shared culture and entertainment.
REVIEW
It is with no doubt that the Korean Wave created a globalized culture. After the rise of the Hallyu Wave, Korea decided to be involved in the intercultural and international issues which included their own culture and abroad cultures (Sunny Yoon). When it comes to explaining the evolution / spread of the Korean Wave (Hallyu) the term hybridity is important. Hybridity is the “adaptation and active articulation of global processes with local norms, taste, needs and traditions” (???). In relation to this definition, the Korean Pop culture managed to appeal to different cultural groups through their drama, music, cuisine, entertainment and dance. K-pop managed to reach a wider audience because their content is apolitical, gentle and polite. This appeals mostly to families and they believe their children can watch anything to do the Korean Wave because it teaches their children how to grow up in an ethical manner.
Although the music or movies are in Korean the media makes conscious effort to promote their product internationally by strongly injecting English lyrics. For example, the Girl’s Generation’s hit song “Gee’, features the lyrics “gee gee gee gee baby baby baby.” This appeals to those Asians that are not English speakers because of its simplicity ( Synergy, The Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies:2017). One of the K-Pop groups SeoTaiji and boys incorporated the American style like rap and hip hop. It was classified as revolutionary domestically, but this made a huge impact internationally because it was a combination Korean and American culture which made the US to easily digest the Korean Wave. This shows the great levels of hybridity that the Korean Wave and many scholars have agreed that the popular culture is successful on a global scale.
The New Yorker article ‘Factory Girls’ (Seabrook 2012) claims that the Korean culture is merely just a Korean national phenomenon and not a global sensation. This is because the article states that the Korean cultural industry mainly focuses on the physical beauty of young girls rather than their actual music and art talent. However, Appudurai denotes that the Korean Wave is a result of diverse-global-cultural flows and is a cultural product. According to him the cultural product consists of five scopes “technoscapes (dynamics of technology), ethnoscapes (movement of people), ideoscapes (dynamics of ideas), finanscapes (movements of money) and mediascapes (dynamics of media)”. All these scapes have a major role to play in the Korean Wave because they create a multi-world which comprises of ethnicities, cultures, values, lifestyles, nations and diverse groups of people.
Factors contributing to the growth of the Korean Wave
Increased focus on infrastructure
To be able to be a part of an experience, you need to sometimes visit the place that connects to you on a personal level, which could be a spot where a movie you watched was acted. The Korean government was able to spend a significant amount of money on infrastructure in the entertainment industry.
Lifting the ban on foreign travel for Koreans
In the early 90s, the Korean government managed to lift the ban on the foreign travel for Koreans that had been imposed a long time ago. This was probably one of the major factors in the growth of the Korean culture. This initiative made a way for many Koreans to travel and explore the Western culture. During their exploration many would pursue their education and would return to Korea. This bought new perspective and different interpretations to music, art and movies. It was quite a stepping stone for the young and qualified talent to also explore opportunities within Korea.
Banning the censorship laws
Any content from movie makers or artists that was considered as controversial was banned from the media through the Korean censorship laws. After 1996 the censorship laws were reversed resulting in opportunities being created for young and vibrant Koreans helping them to express themselves through music and cinema.
All of the above factors made Korea to be such a conducive cultural environment for the young and energetic and gave them a chance to experiment with movies, drama and music. As the Korean bands had adapted to US rap music, they managed to merge it with the Korean taste this meant that they managed to pull the Asian and US crowd. Due to the factors the Korean Wave has managed to grow exponentially since 1999 and has been identified as a major cultural phenomenon.
Cultural Media Industries
The growth of the Korean Wave was also fueled by the social media technology through the use of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. The use of social media and digital technologies resulted in Korea exporting $80.9 million worth of music in 2010, which was an increase of 159% from 2009 (Sriprasit 2012). Social media has managed to create a great connection between the Hallyu fans and stars. For example, if a star tweets on twitter the fans would comment.
ADD FOR FACTORS
Effects and Challenges of the Korean Wave
Since the emergence of the Korean Wave, there has been a drastic change in the number of foreign visitors. Due to the image created by the Korean Wave, tourists from all parts of the world have been flocking Korea to experience first-hand of the Korean culture. The tourists also get to an opportunity to visit shooting locations. The number of tourists has increased from 300,000 in 1998 to about 11 million in 2014 after the Korean Wave had begun. Of the total number of tourists, Asia accounted for 70% in 1998 increasing to 85% on 2014(???). Such an increase in the number of tourists has encouraged the Korean government to try and sustain the Korean Wave because it is seen as a major contributor to the Korean tourism industry.
The growth of the Korean Wave has led to a vast spread of cultural globalization. It has managed to penetrate through over 60 countries, and this has made Korea to be named one of the top ten countries of cultural export.
The Korean popular culture improved the country’s image. As they also had a significant impact to the fashion industry, New York appeared in the K-pop girl groups. The dressing of some of the celebrities like G-Dragon proved to be influential because it got international notice by mixing different styles. The explosion of the Hallyu provided an opportunity for Korea to showcase their diverse entertainment products and culture creating a very strong brand for Korea. As K-Pop has attained a universal appeal and being able to break into the American music market the K-Pop has managed to collaborate with well renowned American artists like Snoop Dogg (Hangover, PSY, 2014) and Missy Elliot (Niliria, G-Dragon, 2013). Due to this, it has increased the number of foreign contestants that have showed interest in collaborating to K-
Pop stars, in spite of language and cultural differences.
Below is a table showing foreign contestants
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K-Pop Competitions (Year) |
Contestants, Name, Nationality |
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Mnet Superstar K Season 3 (2011 – 2012)
Season 6 (2014- Ongoing) |
Chris Golightly/US
Brad Moore (Busker Busker)/US
Jason Ray/US
MICA/Philippines
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Mnet Show Me the Money 3 (2014) |
Toyanna Rae/US
|
|
TvN K-Pop Star Hunt (2011 – 2014) |
Contestants selected are form Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia
|
|
SBS K-Pop Star Season 2 (2012 – 2013) |
Nicole Curry/US |
(Eun-Young Jung: 2009)
Moreover, the increased growth of the Korean Wave has made the government more supportive and to promote the country’s culture. The government awards the young youth for their innovative ideas, this further motivates the youths into wanting to do more. As a result of this many more young adults are not interested in enrolling into Korean universities, this creates cultural immersion as different student from all parts of the world get to learn not only Korean culture or language but from all over the world.
It is with no doubt that the Korean wave has grown exponentially over the last few years, it is inevitable that some challenges might arise.
· More Thai women are travelling to Korea for plastic surgery
· Young Bhutanese are moving away from their traditional values and culture especially because of the Korean inspired clothing sold in their shops.
Hallyu and Globalization
Due to instant communication and information through the use of social media, everything is available to anyone and everywhere around the world. It has also changed the interaction between societies. As mentioned earlier in the paper, the Korean Wave is a kind of a popular culture that has spread around the globe making it a global culture. This is witnessed by some foreign artists being styled like the Korean artists, it has also become a normality seeing people from different countries doing cover dances or songs. This is clear evidence that the Hallyu has spread beyond the borders of Korea.
The usage of social networking was a way to cast-off and globalize the Korean Wave, this therefore means that the Hallyu does not only belong to Korea, but it is now a globalized phenomenon. This creates the border-less
METHODOLOGY Comment by [email protected]: Why did you pick three nationalities?Why from china to avoid bias
Study Design
For this research, it is best to use semi-structured interviews that will generate qualitative information. By doing so, three different nationalities will be interviewed (Chinese, Korean and Argentina) because the main objective was to get an understanding of the Korean from different perspectives. As mentioned earlier in the paper, first-hand information is vital, and the use of this research method allows the researcher to gain information from personal lived human experience. For example, an interview with a Korean will depict how the Korean Wave has made a huge impact within Korea. Because it was an open-ended process, it allowed the researcher to gather information from the individual’s emotional response.
Methodology Table
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My Approach
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Explanation |
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Role of theory in research
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Inductive |
Finding and observing data which is collected through primary research and concluding with a theory (Bryman, 2009)
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Epistemology
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Interpretivism |
Collection of data through interviews. This is because the research aims to gain information based on personal experience and how the Korean Wave might have changed their behavior through the influence of the society.
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Methodology
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Qualitative |
In-depth study can be attained on how interviewees feel about the Korean Wave. |
Sampling Strategy
As discussed earlier the research method being used is semi-structured interview which will generate qualitative data. As much as qualitative data is time consuming it provides in-depth information which will give better understanding of the research. A small sample size of three was used to obtaine to information, reason being it is much easier and less time consuming when transcribing the data. The hand-picking method of two of the interviewees (Argentine and Chinese) was used in the research, this is known as the predetermined group (WHY??). To get the other interviewee it was through linear snowball sampling which is
Limitations
Like any other research method, the use of semi-structured interviews does have its own flaws. It is time consuming based on the fact that after the researcher is done interviewing there is need to transcribe the data that they would have collected. As the interviewees are of different nationalities one of them being from Korea, the reliability might be questioned because they might give accurate data or rather surf some information that might appear as a negative image of Korea.
· Cause and effect cannot be inferred
· Difficult to compare answers
· Can’t guarantee honesty of participants
· Flexibility of interview may lessen reliability
· Open ended questions are difficult to analyse
Research Questions
1. What is your own personal understanding of the Korean Wave?
2. Which genre are you familiar with?
3. Is the Korean culture that is exported the same as within?
4. In your own view is the Korean Wave good or bad?
5. Have you ever had any personal experience/encounter with the Korean Wave (could be through attending music concert)?
6. Based on the fact that the Korean Wave has managed to spread intensively over the few years. Do you think they will be able to maintain the image that they have created?
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