Lecturer by Dr Leung Yuk-ming Lisa
Associate Professor, Department of Cultural Studies, Lingnan University Hong Kong
Korean wave has taken East Asia and the world by storm: ‘You from the Stars’ (Korean drama), Gangnam Style, and of course boy and girl bands, have been topping the charts in East Asia, and have found their in European and American markets like never before. While many question the uniqueness of K-pop, others defended the authenticity of some musical elements as ‘Korean’. This brings back an age old question: how do popular cultures travel across cultures? Does the local flavor play a part in it, and how much? Where is the ‘Korean’ in the Korean wave, and how much does it matter? In this lecture, I shall try to reinvestigate notions such as ‘cultural odour’, ‘cultural discount’ to see how Korean wave could be so successful in this network era. Using the case of Korean wave, we will question the different aspects/ layers that globalized popular culture interplays with the local, by ask the following: i) the ‘flow’ of popular culture as mediation – how does popular culture travel? ii) impact of Korean wave as a brand on geo-politics, and social movements. Eventually I shall discuss the use of popular culture, locally and globally. At the end of this session, we can gain a new insight into the critical mapping of global popular culture, everyday life, and politics.
Lisa Y.M. LEUNG is Associate Professor at the Department of Cultural Studies in Lingnan University. Her main research interests are television and journalism studies, gender and communication, media globalization, and discourses of multiculturalism. One of her recent research focuses on the flow of media and cultural products across Asia, and (social) media and political participation. Her publications cover a range of topics including online (news) media and social movement, transnational reception of popular cultural products across Asia, and the cultural negotiation of ethnic minorities in Hong Kong. She recently published Understanding South Asians in Hong Kong, the Chinese translation of which will be published in 2016.
Thursday, November 5 – 7pm
Connecting Space Hong Kong
G/F, 18-20 Fort Street, North Point, Hong Kong