GEC- Sociology of Music: Genre, Society, and Self
(CA ASSIGNMENT)
Name : Nancy Kaim Roll no. : 22/CS/43 Sem : VIII Course : BSc(Hons) CS
Introduction
Music has always been social, and genres like K-Pop highlight this effectively. Koren Popular
music — K-Pop originated in South Korea after its economy had been devastated by the
crisis of 1997-1998 and evolved globally through the use of digital means. It is
simultaneously a cultural product, an identity resource, and a site of power. This essay
analyses K-Pop's sociocultural background, the communities formed by K-Pop, the
controversies associated with K-Pop, and ultimately, what K-Pop represents about music,
capitalism, and belonging.
Why This Genre?
My introduction to K-Pop came through digital mediation. An anime YouTube singer I
followed uploaded a video covering "Serendipity," a BTS song that I originally thought was
just another unknown Asian pop song. However, it wasn't until I saw BTS perform their song
"Fake Love" at the 2018 Billboard Music Awards that I recognised them, having been
introduced to K-Pop through both Japanese anime and Western pop. As observed by
Shepherd & Devine (2015), access to music is influenced by the cultural flows and platforms
we already have available to us. Additionally, what kept me interested in BTS was their
philosophical honesty and genius musicality; the lyrics of their songs speak to the social and
educational struggles of youth with very impressive production quality. At the time, I was
listening to BTS relatively privately, almost rebelliously, due to my family's disapproval, but
during the pandemic, I started editing videos and creating a fandom page for K-Pop in India
that accumulated more than 50,000 followers, discovering that private listening had quietly
become collective belonging.
Social Origins and History
K-Pop has emerged as a global music genre and did not happen naturally as a result of
traditional music from cultures around the world; instead, K-Pop is an example of how the
industries behind the genre created it from scratch, a product of deliberate industrial
engineering. As pointed out by Etzkorn (1974), music does not exist on its own; music is
created and shaped by the social structures/contexts that give rise to it.
K-Pop's early roots go back to the post-colonisation and post-war periods of Korea (1940s
and 50s), with the establishment of a U.S. military base. The U.S. military presence brought
jazz, blues, and Western pop music to Korean musicians, establishing a cultural connection
with these forms of music to create the first examples of K-Pop as a musical genre. However,
the definitive moment of K-Pop's birth is widely located on April 11, 1992, when Seo Taiji
and Boys performed live on TV in Korea, incorporating hip-hop, rock, and dance music,
performing in a way never before experienced in Korea. Seo Taiji and Boys used their lyrics
for social statements to challenge the censorship laws of the government. Seo Taiji and Boys
is a perfect cultural example of Friedman’s (2013) argument that popular music often serves
as a vehicle to express social protests and the negotiation of power.
The 1997 Asian Financial Crisis accelerated the evolution of K-Pop as an international
phenomenon, transforming it into a global industry. In the wake of economic ruin, the South
Korean government viewed developing cultural exports as a means to create new economic
possibilities and subsequently began to promote what would later be referred to as Hallyu —
the Korean Wave. Entertainment conglomerates such as SM Entertainment (1995), JYP
Entertainment (1997), and YG Entertainment (1998), subsequently formalised the practice of
developing artists through a systematic "idol" trainee programme, in which artists are trained
for many years in various aspects of performance (vocal, dance), language (English, Korean,
Japanese, Chinese), and image management (being attractive). As Manuel (1988) noted,
popular music industries draw upon both economic and technological infrastructures (to
produce commercially viable musical products) as well as on artistic impulses (to create
artistic musical products), and K-Pop is no exception to that rule; K-Pop reflects the
influences of state ministries and corporate boardrooms, as well as artistic labour.
Listeners, Identity, and Belonging
While there is considerable variation among K-Pop's various audiences, the commonality
among many fans is that they tend to be younger, more digitally connected and comprise a
higher percentage of females. Understanding who listens to K-Pop and why they do so
requires moving beyond demographic description toward what Bennett (2015) calls the
deeper relationship between music, community, and self. According to Bennett, musical
engagement goes beyond being a purely aesthetic experience; rather, it is an action through
which individuals establish an identity, negotiate their place in a community and the broader
social world. The K-Pop fandom exemplifies this phenomenon at an exceptional level.
Communities of fans of particular groups or artists known as fandoms operate as fluid,
affective communities. For instance, a fan of BTS in Mumbai and a fan in São Paulo can
share fan-created content and coordinate streaming efforts for their favourite artist. These
actions illustrate how K-Pop creates a sense of belonging among fans of K-Pop beyond
traditional geographic borders, in ways that previous, older generations of music did not
achieve. This transnational dimension of identity formation through music is something
Shepherd and Devine (2015) identify as increasingly central to the sociology of music in the
digital age.
The social stigma surrounding K-Pop fandom is not abstract — it is lived, gendered, and
deeply local. As a female listener in a patriarchal household, my engagement with K-Pop was
met not with curiosity but with moral suspicion, as a sign of waywardness. This indicates that
the individual’s tastes are outside of society’s accepted parameters. At school, my peers,
especially males, responded with resentment towards the Korean musicians who challenged
the traditional gender norms with their music and aesthetics. There were also claims that
females, by liking anything of a foreign origin (men or music), were unpatriotic, and they
lacked nationalistic pride. My own experiences are reflective of the idea of the cultural
policing of one’s own taste. Broadening Weidman's (2003) point about how cultural
participation will always be gendered in the experiences of women, therefore, anything that
women choose to listen to, admire, or desire has never been treated neutrally.
Spaces, Media, and Technology
K-Pop used to mostly be regionally distributed via TV music programs and physical album
sales. Streaming platforms like Spotify, YouTube, Apple Music, etc., changed everything.
Today, it inhabits intensely private and public spaces simultaneously — bedroom
headphones, gym playlists, college fests, concerts and online fan cafes. As Manuel (1988)
notes, the technological shifts fundamentally change the entire process of commercialising
popular music, and K-Pop has taken this shift into account more so than any other genre.
Fans coordinate in global streaming campaigns to get their favourite songs higher up on
music charts, knowing that the success of the song on the charts will lead to it being
promoted more on those platforms. This is an example of what some scholars studying digital
culture refer to as fan labour, which is most of the time unpaid and emotionally based work
being done that directly benefits corporations producing and promoting entertainment. As
Shepherd & Devine (2015) explain, mediation is not just a neutral process; it also determines
how people experience music and how communities around music form. I have witnessed the
influence of this phenomenon in my personal life; in that, the number of times I have
streamed a record or listened to something on Spotify has become a form of social currency
in my many fan communities; therefore there is also an unspoken expectation to prove my
loyalty through measurable listening, a unique combination of love, identity, and digital
performance.
Power, Values, and Controversies
K-Pop's global appeal conceals significant internal contradictions. For instance, the idol
system used by K-Pop agencies completely commodifies the idols by controlling their diet,
appearance and relationships with others. Dating bans were created to keep their artists
romantically available to others, thus allowing them to create an emotional relationship with
their fans through the use of parasocial intimacy (Oh, 2013). The Big Four K-Pop agencies
— HYBE, SM, JYP and YG are the main beneficiaries of this relationship and K-Pop idols
are subjected to exploitative contracts that are continually scrutinised. Idols are debuted as
young as fourteen by management companies who play upon the fetishisation of young
teenagers to display their dual identities - childlike innocence (Saeji, 2013).
The vast majority of K-Pop has a heavy influence from African American musical traditions,
i.e., sampling from greats such as James Brown and the 90's R&B sound known as New Jack
Swing, but the K-Pop industry doesn't give any credit or payback to the African Americans
who created those sounds. Neuman (1980) researched gharana musicians from India and
found that when the music of a gharana musician becomes commercialised, the traditional
hereditary custodians of the music, that is, the gharana, are pushed aside. The same can be
said for the African American artists who have been marginalised by the music industry and
create the music that the K-Pop industry profits from.
While many instances of K-Pop messaging reinforce conformity, the Love Yourself and
Speak Yourself campaigns by BTS are notable exceptions due to their focus on both mental
health and self-acceptance, as well as culminating in BTS’s address to the United Nations’
General Assembly in 2018. Since both anxiety, self-worth, and emotional vulnerability are
part of everyday life for the generation of people with whom these messages are resonating,
Lie (2014) suggests that Gen Z’s relationship with K-Pop, at times, goes beyond simply
listening and enters into something much deeper.
Reflection: Listening Sociologically
According to Supičić (1987), the sociology of music has been developed to expose those
hidden social structures that exist within music; when you see something, you cannot unsee
it. Analysing K-Pop sociologically helped me connect the dots on how it operates at its core.
What once felt like personal pleasure now reveals itself as a carefully engineered commercial
experience. K-Pop originated from and spread through the Japanese Music market and then to
many other East Asian countries until finally making its way to the Western world. Southeast
Asian audiences are treated as secondary consumers, whose digital labour is often overlooked
(Oh, 2013). I also notice how fandom itself has become a site of manufactured loyalty. De
Nora's (2004) argument of music as a technology of the self indicates that K-Pop music
shapes the process of self-construction. It proactively develops fans' identities through the
manufacture and marketing of K-Pop artists. Yet, while these companies are profiting from
fans' emotional connection to an artist, they are providing very little (if any) protection for the
artists in return. K-Pop reveals what Manuel (1988) observed about all popular music
industries — what happens to cultural expressions when they become commercialised. The
economic effects of commercialism are visible when K-Pop idols sign contracts with big
fashion brands like Gucci, YSL and Dior; this reinforces the commercialisation of music as a
commodity and the transformation of music as an expression of culture into a means through
which artistic expression becomes a social mobility strategy.
Conclusion
K-Pop isn't just entertainment; it reflects how globalisation, digital capitalism and
art/commercialisation have become intertwined in today's society. While K-Pop originated in
South Korea, it has transcended the South Korean borders and become a global phenomenon
that allows millions of people to construct their own version of identity, community and
emotions. K-Pop's phenomenal success illustrates that music makes people feel connected to
their community, has power, and commodifies culture and will often do so at the expense of
the people who create it.
Reference
Bennett, Andy. 2015. "Identity: Music, Community, and Self." In The Routledge Reader on
the Sociology of Music, edited by John Shepherd and Kyle Devine, pp. 143–150. Routledge,
London.
De Nora, Tia. 2004. Music in Everyday Life. Cambridge University Press, UK.
Etzkorn, K. Peter. 1974. "On Music, Social Structure and Sociology." International Review of
the Aesthetics and Sociology of Music 5(1): 43–49.
Friedman, J. 2013. The Routledge History of Social Protest in Popular Music. Routledge,
London.
Lie, John. 2014. K-Pop: Popular Music, Cultural Amnesia, and Economic Innovation in
South Korea. University of California Press, Berkeley.
Manuel, Peter. 1988. "Popular Music in India: 1901–86." Popular Music 7(2): 157–176.
Cambridge University Press.
Neuman, Daniel M. 1980. The Life of Music: The Organization of an Artistic Tradition.
University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Oh, Ingyu. 2013. "K-Pop in Korea: How the Pop Music Industry Is Changing a
Post-Developmental Society." Sociological Inquiry 83(3): 405–461.
Saeji, CedarBough T. 2013. "Juvenile Protection and Sexual Objectification: Analysis of the
Performance Frame in Korean Music Television Broadcasts." Acta Koreana 16(2).
Shepherd, John and Kyle Devine. 2015. "Introduction." In The Routledge Reader on the
Sociology of Music, pp. 1–14. Routledge, London.
Supičić, Ivo. 1987. "Sociology of Music and Ethnomusicology." The World of Music 29(1):
34–39.
Weidman, Amanda. 2003. "Gender and the Politics of Voice: Colonial Modernity and
Classical Music in South India." Cultural Anthropology 18(2): 194–232.