The formation of Korean popular culture and its popularity in Thailand

Abstract

“Korean popular culture”, more recently, is perceived by many people around the world in the form of Korean cultural product which widely consumed among Asian people and it continues to expand to other continents such as, North America, Middle East, for instance. In this study, I will clarify the structure and the formation of Korean popular culture which encountered many processes in several circumstances since it relates to political, economic and social factors which will be included in this study. In Thailand, the popularity of Korean culture has played a significant role in Thai society in some certain degree, particularly, Korean popular culture. The rise of Korean popular culture as many people know as “Korean Wave” or Hallyu (coined by Chinese media) can be categorized in many categories such as films, dramas, Korean popular songs (K-POP) and the like. The export of Korean culture has been done successfully due to the support of the government and the ideologies that Korean people belong to, simply speaking, nationalism, cultural hybridity, for instance. In this study, I will demonstrate the background and the structure of how Korean popular culture is formed and also became one of the powerful cultures in the global stage, particularly in Asia. Moreover, this also affects to Thailand since Korean popular culture is welcomed by Thai people as obviously can be seen from the influx of Korean popular culture such as Korean electronic products, Korean food, Tourism and Korean entertainment industries, this resulted from the influence of cultural proximity. However, the rising trend of Korean popular culture might gradually fade away in the near future as former dominant culture, Western culture and Japanese popular culture, already passed. Because every culture has the cycle life in the period of time, beginning –rising – falling and finally gradually disappear and the new form of culture might replace the former one. It is the simply cycle of the cultural role in every society, including Korean popular culture.