FROM FACTORY GIRLS TO K-POP IDOL GIRLS (FALL 2022)
It’s undeniable that pop culture and the media play a major role in shaping and affecting our thoughts, attitudes, and behavior. It’s important, then, that we understand the underlying factors driving how the pop culture we consume is made.
This Fall, join Sông2Sea to read From Factory Girls to K-Pop Idol Girls, which examines how the status quo we live in maintains itself through popular media culture.
We’ll explore and contextualize the global spread and success of K-pop via an analysis of the current structural conditions in the music industry and Korea’s economic development trajectories after World War 2, neoliberalism, free market capitalism, the global financial system, patriarchy, and gendered labor.
We’ll look at the discourse around “girl power” and “girl boss” how they are marketed and positioned as feminist progress, and how the concepts of representation and identity politics have veered from their origins. We’ll discuss if it’s possible that popular culture, and representation in the entertainment industry, can also be used for progressive social transformation.
We will also listen to and watch our ults and biases, and build relationships with one another.
Thirty spots are available for this book club. Given the popularity of the Hallyu wave, we recommend early sign-ups. We hope you’ll join us.
Schedule
Session 1 – October 23
Review community agreements and welcome packet
Introductions & Chapter 1 — Popular Culture as a Strategic Field of Neoliberal Intervention: Developmentalism, Neoliberal Social Policy, and Governmentality in Post-IMF Korean Popular Music Industry, 45 pages.
Session 2 – October 30
Chapter 2 – K-pop Idol Girl Groups as Cultural Genre of Neoliberalism: Patriarchy, Developmentalism, and Structure of Feeling/Experience in K-pop, 15 pages
Session 3 – November 6
Chapter 3 – Between Hybridity and Hegemony in K-pop's Global Popularity: A Case of Girls' Generation's American Debut, 17 pages
Session 4 – November 13
Chapter 4 – Genealogy and Affective Economy of K-pop Female Idols: From Cute and Innocent to Ambiguous Femininity, to Explicit Sexuality, 15 pages
Session 5 – November 20
Chapter 5 – Elusive Subjectivity of K-pop Female Idols: Split-personality, Narcissism, and Neo-Confucian Body Techniques in Suzy of Miss A, 15 pages
Session 6 – December 4
Chapter 6 – Resilience, Positive Psychology, and Subjectivity in K-pop Female Idols: Evolutions of Girls' Generation from “Into the New World” (2007) to “All Night” (2017), 13 pages
Session 7 – December 11
Chapter 7 & Conclusion – The 90s, the Most Stunning Days of Our Lives: Retro K-pop Music, Nostalgia, and Positive Psychology in Contemporary Korea, 20 pages