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In Hegemonic Mimicry, Kyung Hyun Kim considers the recent global success of Korean popular culture-the Korean wave of pop music, cinema, and television, which is also known as hallyu-from a transnational and transcultural perspective. Using the concept of mimicry to think through hallyu's adaptation of American sensibilities and genres, he shows how the commercialization of Korean popular culture has upended the familiar dynamic of major-to-minor cultural influence, enabling hallyu to become a dominant global cultural phenomenon. At the same time, its worldwide popularity has rendered its Koreanness opaque. Kim argues that Korean cultural subjectivity over the past two decades is one steeped in ethnic rather than national identity. Explaining how South Korea leaped over the linguistic and cultural walls surrounding a supposedly "minor" culture to achieve global ascendance, Kim positions K-pop, Korean cinema and television serials, and even electronics as transformative acts of reappropriation that have created a hegemonic global ethnic identity.
List of contents
Preface: Writing Pop Culture in the Time of Pandemic ix
Introduction: Of Mimicry and
Miguk 1
1. Short History of K-Pop, K-Cinema, and K-Television 35
2. The Souls of Korean Folk in the Era of Hip-Hop 85
3. Dividuated Cinema: Temporality and Body in the Overwired Age 118
4.
Running Man: The Korean Television Variety Program and Affect Confucianism 140
5. The Virtual Feast:
Mukbang, Con-Man Comedy, and the Post-Traumatic Family in
Extreme Job (2019) and
Parasite (2019) 164
6. Korean Meme-icry: Samsung and K-Pop 195
7. Reading
Muhan Dojon through the
Madangg¿k 220
Notes 237
Bibliography 273
Index 289
About the author
Kyung Hyun Kim
Summary
Kyung Hyun Kim considers the recent global success of Korean popular culture—the Korean wave of pop music, cinema, and television also known as hallyu—from a transnational and transcultural perspective.
