Korean Cultural Center in Belgium hosted a special lecture "Korean Wave: Beyond the Market and State"
The Korean Cultural Center in Belgium hosted a special lecture "Korean Wave: Beyond the Market and State" by inviting Hallyu expert Professor Hong Seok-kyeong at the University of Leuven on last Wednesday (February 22).
In this lecture, Professor Hong Seok-kyeong explained from various perspectives how Korean popular culture was able to become an international popular culture that goes beyond Asia and is enjoyed all over the world in a short period of time.
She first took a look at the historical background and development process of Korean pop culture, also known as ‘Korean Wave’, and explained how local culture became a global culture. In addition, taking the BTS phenomenon and the popularity of Netflix Korean Wave content as examples, the process of spreading the Korean Wave using various media and the phenomenon of global acceptance were also pointed out. After the lecture, she had a Q&A session with about 80 participants to discuss Hallyu, K-Pop, and Korean society.
Professor Hong Seok-Kyeong said that after obtaining a Ph.D. in Journalism and Communications at the University of Grenoble, France, she has served as an Associate Professor at the Department of Communications and Communications at University of Bordeaux 3 since 2000. Since 2013, she has been a professor at Seoul National University's Department of Communication.
In her 2020 book <BTS On the Road>, Professor Hong Seok-kyung, who has published a number of papers related to the Korean Wave, creatively transcends the limitations of Hallyu and K-pop, and unravels BTS as a cultural product from a cultural industrial and social perspective.
This lecture was held in cooperation with the Institute of Korean Studies at the University of Leuven. The University of Leuven opened a Korean studies class in 2017, and a total of 600 students have participated in the class so far, and the number of students is increasing every year along with the popularity of the Korean Wave.
