Today, I brought a New Yorker article. The title is Gangnam Style in Various Perspectives. This article was published in honor of the 10th anniversary of Gangnam Style in 2022. As you may know, The New Yorker strives to look at specific issues related to New York from various angles and delves deeply into the content. This article also provides a different perspective on Korea and Gangnam while faithfully delivering information about Korea and Gangnam to American readers. Today's video is based on the article, which is somewhat lengthy and well-written, so I minimized the summary. Seoul, the capital of South Korea, leaves a particularly good first impression in terms of infrastructure. With the extension opening of the Shinbundang Line connecting to the existing lines, another subway line has been added. Among the four stations, Sinsa Station, located in the northernmost part, is associated with Korea's globally famous plastic surgery industry.

Gangnam, the most southern area well known by the region, doesn't need a separate introduction. On one side of the platform at Gangnam Station on the Sinbundang Line, there is a large mural paying tribute to Psy, the singer who introduced Gangnam to the world with Gangnam Style ten years ago. However, Psy was not an ambassador of popular culture. At the time of the release of Gangnam Style, he was a 34-year-old dropout from Berklee College of Music, not well known internationally, and had a history of criticism for his music content and personal behavior within the country. As a singer and rapper, he was a playful character, impeccably handsome, but not associated with the global popularity of K-pop, organized by boy bands and girl groups. He seemed to exist in a separate reality from the world of K-pop. However, he was the one who finally made a breakthrough in the West, not SHINee, Wonder Girls, or BIGBANG. Just for your information.

BTS officially debuted the following year, causing a global sensation. What's even more surprising is that Psy succeeded in appealing to Koreans with jokes. His Big Hit Entertainment mocked the flashy and culturally poor show-offs of the rich in Seoul, Gangnam, without clear evidence. Psy once likened Gangnam to Beverly Hills in Korea, but although it may evoke the luxurious reputation of Gangnam, it is not an appropriate expression in terms of scale. Literally, Gangnam covers half of Seoul. Here, Gang means the Han River that runs through the city like the Thames in London. Below the Han River, there is a district called Gangnam, which is almost three times larger than Beverly Hills. When Korean dramas depict Gangnam, they show high-rise buildings, luxury boutiques, nightclubs, and streets full of imported cars, portraying the upper class society.

Symbols are constantly used, but until the early 1970s, this place was nothing more than farmland. The development of Gangnam into a city, different from the countryside, progressed rapidly along the line drawn by the military government of Korea in the late 1960s. In the process, the landowners here who used to farm became wealthy. Gangnam Style reveals a sharp awareness of the quaintness behind its pseudo-international glamour. Shortly after this song and music video became an international sensation, South Korea's new Yang Byeong-ho expressed the following in an article: It is a bold and unreserved challenge to the authority and solemnity of the older generation, aiming for a subtle subversion of familiar conventional notions, lyrics, actions, and dances. Referring to the export of popular culture that has swept Asia in the early 21st century and strengthened South Korea's soft power, he also used the term Hallyu.

He pointed out as follows, this attitude is juxtaposed with existing music that consciously promotes the Korean Wave. Gangnam Style, with its almost supernaturally catchy rhythm, compliments the complexity of modernity through irony and satire in a concise manner. Yang Shi, who praised the power of succinctly embodying complicated modernity, suggested that his fellow citizens should simply enjoy everything they can enjoy about this phenomenon without overthinking or analyzing it. However, even if many Koreans followed this advice, it would have been difficult for Gangnam Style to become the first YouTube video to reach 1 billion views on its own. According to a study conducted by researchers at Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, Gangnam Style did not spread directly from Korea to the world; it actually started in the Philippines, where there was already a passionate fan base for Korean culture. In Manila, starting from Korean cosmetics to Korean dramas, there was a fervent fan base for all things Korean.

Everything related can be easily found. However, as exposure of broadcasts is strengthened as mentioned in Mr. Uyujeong's book, at times, the image of Korea can be conveniently perceived only with positive aspects through a collage with commercial advertisements lacking a solid narrative. In the early 21st century, Korean hit songs also showed Korea's new richness in a simple way. However, this period was also a time when a new heyday of Korean cinema opened. Films like Isle by Kim Kiduk, Oasis by Lee Chang-dong, and Oldboy by Park Chan-wook hinted at the discomfort and agony, implying that not everything is good in this silent morning land. The music video for Gangnam Style also gives a similar implication but in a much more cheerful way. The video starts with a shot of someone holding a drink, leaning on the determination of the sandy beach.

Then as the scene fades back, the actual background is revealed to be a neighborhood playground instead of a beach. Remember how strange Gangnam Style seemed to many Westerners when they first saw it ten years ago, a little effort is needed. I recall hearing that a prominent Canadian writer felt like he was on drugs when he first saw it. There were elements that were indescribable, such as a boy imitating Michael Jackson, a sudden explosion, sexy ladies in hay, a disco ball on a bus, and more. However, he was captivated by the peculiar charm of the music itself and ended up watching it repeatedly. Even if many Western viewers do not understand the satirical planning in this video, they can still sense that something deeper is unfolding. Despite the fact that many Western viewers may not grasp the satirical planning in this video, they can still sense that something deeper is unfolding. Gangnam Style has entertained Western audiences for decades.

The context of Psy's Gangnam Style, which was introduced for den contextualization in Japan, did not originate from existing Asian popular culture. Gangnam Style reveals self-consciousness and even irony. Even if non-Koreans couldn't understand what Psy was mocking, they could at least recognize that he had a sense of humor. His boastful lyrics and intense demeanor create a stark contrast with harshly realistic environments such as wind-blown parking lots, public restrooms, and trash-filled alleys. True to the Gangnam Style, Psy's character blindly challenges the surrounding extravagance and emptiness, stubbornly insisting on his own charm. Satirical projects like Gangnam Style were followed by many Korean artists. Director Bong Joon-ho succeeded in achieving a very convincing balance between social criticism and the commerciality of the film in the 2019 movie Parasite.

Director Bong Joon-ho portrayed the conflict of the new family imprisoned by each class in the movie Parasite. In the fierce battle of the end scene, Mr. Kim impulsively stabs Mr. Park. This cathartic act is triggered by Mr. Park's disgust towards the smell of the man who secretly lived in his basement. The smell of the lower class, symbolized repeatedly in previous scenes, the stench of futile labor, a pile of destined failures, that smell is exactly this smell. If the characters in the Korean Netflix series Squid Game, which the whole world binge-watched, had a smell, it was undoubtedly this smell. Producer Hwang Dong-hyuk's explanation of this work as a story about class struggle and its critical intensity subtly recalls Parasite. The characteristics of the former make this drama spectacular.

I made it. However, on the other hand, the characteristics of the latter inspired many Western media articles reflecting the unfairness, complaints, inhumanity, and cruelty of Korean society. Western coverage of Korea tends to revert to such boring content as declining birth rates, high suicide rates, conglomerate economic domination, students constantly under pressure, threatening neighbors to the north, and plastic surgery addiction. There is a recurring trend. In the past, in 1988, regarding the Seoul Olympics, Dave Sperling of The Nation even expressed the following: The land of the morning calm is now the land of hard-core pornography, rape, and the fear of death. Even Korea itself, a country trapped in the 19th century, is often referred to as 'Hell Chosun' in Western media. This expression implies that being born in Korea is like going to hell, and a highly regulated system maintained by corrupt politicians and incompetent elites dictates every aspect of life in Korea.

It is an expression reflecting the faith of young people. This skeptical attitude towards Western negativity has helped to explain the remarkable enthusiasm of the West for popular culture contents that criticize themselves, not only typical Korean popular culture contents, over the past ten years since Gangnam Style. Even if Western audiences know little about Korea, if they are ready to perceive Korean society as a dystopia, they will react positively no matter how grotesque the dystopian descriptions are. Western viewers can be reassured by the fact that they do not live in Korea, no matter how serious their own country's issues are. However, some perceptions and implications, if they have ever taken the Seoul subway even once, are highly likely to be convinced that Korea is a more advanced country. The rise of Korea, which has achieved the so-called miracle of the Han River, escaping from the devastating poverty before and after, is mostly admired by wealthy people around the world.

It was achieved by making and selling local products. In the 20th century, fiber, ships, cars, and semiconductors made Korea prosperous. However, in the 21st century, Korea is a country where expressing dissatisfaction with its prosperity has become a lucrative export product in itself. Sometimes, it subtly nudges some Western media and individuals with a narrow view and a sense of superiority. It was a truly impressive article. Also, while looking at Japanese content without context and Korean content with context, it was one of the noticeable contents. Content with context, in other words, content with a narrative, persuades many people, moves them, and remains in their memories. Anyway, in an era where BTS is considered the world's top boy group and many Korean dramas achieve the highest viewership ratings globally, such an era could come.

Perhaps the starting point and one of the detonators could be Gangnam Style. I think the door he opened will leave a long-lasting impact on our popular culture.

서구가 느낀 강남스타일의 등장, 그 괴기스러운 첫 느낌.. 그리고 한국 콘텐츠의 특징

서구가 느낀 강남스타일의 등장, 그 괴기스러운 첫 느낌.. 그리고 한국 콘텐츠의 특징