![K-pop concert showing large number of fans](/sites/default/files/styles/news_and_events_image/public/2024-08/K-pop%20concert%20photo.jpg?h=ec041e41&itok=p21mfH_6)
September 24, 2024 (Tuesday) online
7:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. ET (Everyone)
8:30 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. ET (NCTA 2024 Cohort only)
Wonseok Lee, Yale University
Ann Marie Davis, The Ohio State University
Angie Miesle Stokes, Wayne Trace Jr/Sr High School
What is K-pop? This is a simple yet complicated question as K-pop musically, racially, and nationally variegated. In the conventional sense of the term, K-pop refers to an ethno-national musical genre: dance-pop songs with Korean lyrics performed by predominantly ethnic Korean musicians. However, many cases challenge this simple definition. In this talk, Lee examines how the meaning of “K” in “K-pop” is (re)interpreted by individuals, how K-pop resounds beyond Koreanness, and eventually what elements constitute the K-pop phenomenon today. Among many elements, Lee particularly focuses on the distinctive fan culture in K-pop. Examining several examples, Lee explains why and how fans’ participation is crucial in making the sonic and visual environment of K-pop performance and its sociocultural identity.
Wonseok Lee is a cultural musicologist whose research interests include Korean popular music and culture, globalization, transnationalism, musical identity, media studies, border theory, and posthumanism in music. Lee is a currently postdoctoral associate at the Council on East Asian Studies at Yale, where he works on a book project that examines how K-pop challenges traditional boundaries, including that K-pop should be performed by Koreans and that K-pop idols must be human. Lee received his PhD in Musicology (with emphasis on ethnomusicology) from The Ohio State University.
Free and Open to the Public
If you require an accommodation, such as live captioning, to participate in this event, please contact smith.12674@osu.edu. Requests made at least two weeks in advance of the event will generally allow us to provide seamless access, but the university will make every effort to meet requests made after this date.
This event is coordinated by the East Asian Studies Center at The Ohio State University . Sponsors: University of Pittsburgh national coordinating site for the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia (NCTA) Asian Studies Center, University Center for International Studies and a U.S. Department of Education Title VI grant to the East Asian Studies Center at The Ohio State University.