Hallyu Wavefront
Google’s Big Tent Seoul 2013 event was held on October 30 at Platoon Kunsthalle in Gangnam. The event included a panel discussion titled “Korean Culture and the Internet,” which included Deputy Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Won Yong-gi, CEO of CJ E&M Film Division Jeong Tae-sung, Senior Producer at Korea Broadcasting System (KBS) Kim Hyung-joon, and Professor at Kyung Hee University Dr. Emanuel Pastreich. The panel was moderated by Ms. Yang Young-eun, a news anchor for KBS.
Ms. Yang brought up many interesting questions about ways to use the Internet to bring Korean culture more to the forefront of the global consciousness. Each panelist in turn was able to respond to her questions with unique insights about what the Internet and the Korean Wave means for Korean culture.
Deputy Minister Won first explained his views on why Korean pop culture is becoming popular outside of Korea, focusing on Korean TV dramas. He said that Korean dramas have universal value to a global audience. Their stories most often deal with traditional family values, but usually set in a world where there is a dismantling of the family fabric within a changing society. He made the point that this is happening all over the world, not just in Korea, and that the theme resonates with many other cultures. He also spoke about his time working in London promoting Korean pop music. He said, “But their view of Korean singers, of Korean idols, they viewed them as singers, entertainers who are passionate, dedicated, and performing for them... and because they see that their idols are passionate, they are also becoming more passionate about school, and their parents agreed.” He made the point that Korean pop culture often includes values that parents in other cultures appreciate, and that they enjoy having their children also embracing these values, which are universal.
Dr. Pastreich was asked by Ms. Yang about his perspective as a non-Korean who has studied Korean culture. He emphasized that Korea finds itself today in a unique position as a non-imperial power with global reach, and that it should use that opportunity to its advantage on the global stage. He noted that many people around the world are paying attention to Korea’s culture and values. “Many countries have very high expectations for Korea,” he emphasized. “Many people think that the future of the world will come from Asia. And Korea is the most advanced but also the most human of the major powers.”
But Pastreich also suggested Korea has a long way to go. “People know Samsung and LG, but the history of Korea is largely unknown,” he explained. “You have people in South America saying, ‘I want to be the next Gandhi.’ But you do not have anyone outside of Korea saying, ‘I want to be King Sejong.’ The reason is simple: Koreans have not made Korean culture a part of global culture.”
Kim Hyung-joon of KBS brought up the point that modern Korean culture isn’t exactly very Korean, specifically. He said that the proliferation of modern conveniences, the Internet, cell phones, public transportation, and the like are not exclusive to Korea but are rather shared by almost all of what he referred to as “the mobile generation,” everywhere in the world. And this generation does not view the world through artificial divisions of different countries, but shares everything based simply on interest and shared experience. He said that KBS has been encouraging its viewers online to provide feedback and request music for various programs, and discovered that it has viewers in 140 countries through 190 different web sites via its YouTube videos. And he told a touching story about the recent conflict in Syria. KBS saw a very poor resolution video of a 14-year-old Syrian girl saying that her friends were leaving Syria due to the unrest, and that she missed them. Her best friend and her often listened to Justin Bieber songs, and this girl wanted a noted Korean singer to sing a Justin Bieber song in their memory. “What was interesting was that we posted that on our Facebook, and teenagers all over the world were giving these girls messages of encouragement to stay close and stay friends.” Mr. Kim said. The Syrian girl’s friend was able to find her through this exchange, facilitated by Facebook, YouTube, and KBS. Mr. Kim concluded by saying, “It is important to emphasize Korean culture, but we are also contemporaries. Everyone wants to communicate with each other.” He said that KBS and Korean culture is becoming a way for friends to connect with each other around the globe, and he sounded quite touched by this phenomenon.
This phenomenon of a new online culture was also commented on by CEO Jeong Tae-sung of CJ E&M Film Division. He said “One thing that I’d like to mention is that a German girl actually published a novel in which the main character was a member of the Korean hip hop group 2pm. So this era is really moving around the digital generation, more universal, not confined by nationality.” He emphasized that it is a cultural give-and-take, and this is influencing how CJ E&M is thinking about its online presence.
Finally, Deputy Minister Won spoke about the government’s continuing efforts to make a sustainable Korean culture industry. He spoke about the rise and fall of Japanese and Hong Kong films, and that while they were popular for a time, they also faded from the global consciousness. He said that his Ministry was working to prevent that happening to the Korean film industry by creating a sustainable ecosystem. “Hollywood is able to be maintained because of a certain level of quality is provided by a system,” he explained, “So we have to develop a future system that will completely make this industry sustainable.” He said that the system cannot rely on just one person, but on the industry itself.