The University of Pittsburgh's Department of East Asian Languages & Literatures will host Dr. Yun-Oh Whang of the Katz Graduate School of Business and his talk "The Magic of K-Pop: A Cultural Consumption Perspective" on October 20.
The rise of Korean music (K-Pop) around the world in the last two decades has been a mystery to many industry experts. Some compares it to the explosion of British rock and roll in 1960s (“The British Invasion”), calling it “The Korean Wave (Han-Ryu)”. Even though it is not a part of the main stream music worldwide, it definitely deserves our attention as a cultural sensation. What is the magic ingredient of K-Pop for its worldwide popularity? How has a tiny country such as South Korea become a major exporter of a cultural product? We will first discuss the history of the rise of K-Pop and try to identify the answers to these questions. Our focus will be on K-Pop as a cultural product and examine the market forces including the consumers who adopted K-Pop as their music of choice.The event starts at 12:00 noon in 4130 Posvar Hall (map) and is free and open to the public.