Manufactured Creativity: Production, Performance and Dissemination of K-pop
K-pop represents a unique and distinct Korean system of “manufacturing creativity,” which involves utilizing global music talents. <br /><br />This article documents K-pop a mode of manufactured creativity, explains the term, and examines how K-pop engages in manufacturing creativity. K-pop’s business model is based on talent and represents a blend of U.S. music strategies, which favor consistency and long-term popularity, and Japanese strategies, which favor quick-selling hits. K-pop embodies creativity and longevity. It outsources creativity but also reprocesses those creative ideas internally. Such manufactured creativity is exemplified by SM Entertainment, which has been global since its start. It expanded its business network globally but also emphasized the internal process of finishing songs, which also involves creative skills and talented performers. As a result, global for K-pop is a combination of global and local.
Gil-Sung Park
Korea Journal, 53.4 (2013): 14-33.
<p>Chua, Beng Huat. 2004. “Conceptualizing an East Asian Popular Culture.” <em>Inter- Asia Cultural Studies </em>5.2: 200-221.</p>
<p>Lie, John. 2012. “What Is the K in K-pop? South Korean Popular Music, the Culture Industry, and National Identity.” <em>Korea Observer </em>43.3: 339-363.</p>
<p>Oh, Ingyu. 2009. “Hallyu: The Rise of Transnational Cultural Consumers in China and Japan.” <em>Korea Observer </em>40.3: 425-459.</p>
<p>Oh, Ingyu, and Gil-Sung Park. 2012. “From B2C to B2B: Selling Korean Pop Music in the Age of New Social Media.” <em>Korea Observer </em>43.3: 365-397.</p>
<p>Ryoo, Woongjae. 2009. “Globalization, or the Logic of Cultural Hybridization: The Case of the Korean Wave.” <em>Asian Journal of Communication </em>19.2: 137-151.</p>
Reading the ‘Korean Wave’ as a Sign of Global Shift
This article uses discourse analysis of newspaper and magazine articles during 2001 as well as fieldwork to reveal how the Korean Wave allowed Koreans to develop a different perspective on globalization. It identifies three perspectives that emerged from analysis: a cultural nationalist perspective, which emphasized pride in Korean culture, an industrialist and neoliberal position, which emphasized culture as an industry and focused on the sale of Korean products, and a postcolonial perspective, which emphasized the Korean wave as only the product of capitalism. The Korean wave has continued to grow, sparking a second Korean wave that generated less ideological and more information-based discourse.
Cho Hae-Joang
Korea Journal. 45.5 (2005): 147-182
The Globalization of K-pop: Korea’s Place in the Global Music Industry
<p>This article challenges approaches to Korean popular music based on cultural hybridity by arguing that the globalization of K-pop involves modifying musical content from Europe and other locations into Korean content and redistributing it to global audiences. In doing to, it occupies a void between Western and East Asian music industries. The establishment of the global music industry destroyed traditional structure of music industries based on physical music (albums, cds) by allowing access to music via the Internet and the demarcation between high and low culture; subcultures become easily accessible. Big Three K-pop producers rely on extended and global networks. K-pop represents a new mode of globalization, which involves exporting Korean music abroad, which has happened due to Korea’s economic rise, immigration of Koreans, participation of Korean and overseas Korean populations in global cultural industries and separate manufacturing and distribution. G-L-G (Global-Local-Global) not tenable if the “L” element is not unique. K-pop’s L element is unique because of the emphasis on numbers in groups, appearance and combination of voice and dance. Other music industries may have single aspects, but only K-pop has all three aspects, which create a unique “L” element. K-pop’s success dependent on a particular historical moment and geographic dynamics, contextualized by shifts in Korean culture, such as lifts on bans and technological advancement, which promotes global fan participation, and a global capitalist economy. </p>
Ingyu Oh
Korea Observer 44.3 (2013): 389-409.
Have You Ever Seen The Rain? And Who’ll Stop the Rain?: The Globalizing Project of Korean Pop (K-pop)
<p>Using the Korean artist Rain as a case study, the article examines the Korean music industry and its development into “multi-purpose star management” that creates transnational stars by de-emphasizing their national identity. It also examines the reaction by media and fans.</p>
<p>“Border-crossing Korean pop culture” is part of a larger phenomenon describe as “trans-Asia cultural traffic” (Iwabuchi) or “East Asian pop culture” (Chua). Yet previous studies confine Korean pop culture to the Asia region while K-pop is engaged in a globalizing mission.</p>
<p>Rain functions as a case study because he seeks to transform from a star in Asia into a global star. The means by which this could be achieved is the “star manufacturing system,” where Korean entertainment agencies incorporate production and management within the agency, and includes a training system. This system developed in the wake of the 1997 economic crises and shifts in the production in idol groups in the wake of the decline of music show programs. In order to achieve global star status, the article argues that Rain de-emphasized his Asian identity to embrace a global one in terms of marketing.</p>
Shin Hyunjoon
<i>Inter-Asia Cultural Studies</i>, vol. 10, no. 4, 2009, pp. 507-523.
<p>Howard, Keith. “Exploding Ballads: the Transformation of Korean Pop Music.” <i>Global Goes Local</i>, edited by J. Craig and Richard King, UBC Press, 2002, pp. 80-95.</p>
<p>Lee, Jamie Shin Lee. “Linguistic Hybridization in K-pop: Discourse of Self-Assertion and Resistance.” <i>World Englishes</i>, 2004, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 429-450.</p>
<p>Lee, Jung-yup. “Contesting Digital Economy and Culture: Digital Technologies and the Transformation of Popular Music in Korea.” <i>Inter-Asia Cultural Studies</i>, 2009, vol. 10, no. 4, pp. 489-506.</p>
<p>Shin, Hyunjoon. “K-pop (music) in the Emerging Cultural Economy of Asian pop.” <i>Journal of Communication Arts</i>, vol. 25, no. 4, 2007, pp. 1-11.</p>
<p>Siriyuvasak, Ubonrat and Shin, Hyunjoon.” “’Asianizing K-pop: Production, Consumption and Identification Patterns among Thai Youth.” <i>Inter-Asia Cultural Studies</i>, vol. 8, no. 1, 2007, pp. 109-136.</p>