Case study
Korean Pop, which is widely known as k-pop is gaining its popularity globally, and the word K-Pop is now recognizable among the global music industry. Many Korean pop singers are known, not only in Korea, or even Asia, but all around the world, such as BigBang, Wondergirls, SNSD, TVXQ, Psy and many more. They are the Korean bands that have been attracting followers from Asia, Europe and America, since the early years.
The popularity of Korean contents, also known as ‘Hallyu’, are partly supported by the Korean cultural policy, that has many suggestion in regard to the cultural policy in outskirt countries under globalization. How, the popularity of Hallyu has cultural influence to its neighboring countries and attracted tourism and people to be interested in Korean’s language and culture.
Academic Sources
1) Sterger, M.B. 2002. The Academic Debate over Globalization. In Globalism: The New Market Ideology, 17-41. Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield.

In this article, Sterger talks about the different dimensions of globalization, which is globalization is an economic process, globalization is a Political process and Globalization is a cultural process. In relation to the case study that was chosen, figured that K-Pop was American cultural hegemony, Although music produced by American remain to still have a powerful presence of cultural in Korea’s music marketplace, its fans show themselves as rebels going further away from the mainstream culture, as foreigners who are looking for something different from their current situation. Fundamentally, “’global localization’ replaces ‘global standardization’” (Iwabuchi, K. 2002) as the main form of cultural globalization. From the ‘Americanization’ to ‘Korean Wave’, both economic and political factors play the part in it.

2) Cavicchi, D. (2015). “Fandom before ‘Fan’: Shaping the History of Enthusiastic Audiences.” Reception: Texts, Readers, Audiences, History. May 4.

Cavichhi discusses in his article on how the introductions of technology and mass media such as newspaper, radio, television and the internet, has causes the changes in the fan’s culture. Today, the access to fans from different culture is widely available. Cavicchi argues that the word ‘fans’ have many different definitions and mention that fans itself have their own name that identify them as a fan of certain groups and groups to show the diversity of the group, depending on the context, it may refer to the level of commitment, obsession, identification, political resistance, affinity, enthusiasm or all of the above. This research helps in providing evidences on how technologies affect the evolvement of fandom and its history. By understanding this article, it helps the readers to deeper comprehend the introduction of mass communication within the fan cultures.

3) Lee, J. S. (2004) “Discourse of Self-assertion and Resistance” Linguistic Hybridization in K-pop. March 3.

K-pop has become so dominant that people from around the world starts to listen to the music that are being produced. But often being asked in general by the people, How do the people from the States, Australia or anywhere else other than Asia, knows such or listen to the music that are produced by Koreans? In the article, Lee explained how K-pop hybridize with English language. Lee explained further on the idea of “Language contact phenomenon”, which the music of other language, through code mixing or code-switching makes it merge with western music.

Due to the uses of cross breeding techniques, K-pop has been possessing the music industry, rapidly growing and constantly improving. In the year of 1980, music that are produced by the Koreans have no English language in it, but today, in some part of the songs, English are becoming a part of the “verbal repertoire of young Korean idols and its fans” (Lee, 2004). Which leads to having an English band names, English lyrics and titles of the song. As Korean music started to use English words, foreigners who understand English would at least, find some words familiar in their ear

4) Jung, S. (2011). Korean Masculinity and Trans Cultural Consumption. Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press.

Many are familiar with Korean wave are mostly because of its idols. But what makes them different from other idols from another country? Jung has managed to answer to question in the articles he wrote. He explained that why Korean idols are different from others are mainly because of the differences in cultures. Koreans represents femininity, purity, sweetness, for both male and female. Also, the music industry in Korea, doesn’t only recruit talented idols that are mainly from Korea, but they allow talented individuals from another country and culture that are interested in being a part of K-pop idols, such as Nickhun, who are actually from Thailand and now, he is part of the influential group called 2PM.

5) Kim, Y. (2014). “Sustainable Development of the Korean Wave as a Cultural Industry”: A possibility of the Korean Wave Renaissance Construction Through K-pop.

In this particular article, Kim discussed about the widespread of Korean Wave’s fandom. Thanks to the Mass media today, people from around the world are able to discover the K-pop. Kim believes that the rises of K-pop are to be “related to the prolonged tradition of entertainment culture in Korea” (Kim, Y). Kim explained that “in the era of the digital”, K-pop didnot gain popularity over night, and Kim also mentioned the process on how K-pop gains its popularity. Given the example that during the year of 1990, “Baby Vox, HOT groups appeared and starts the heat of k-pop being discovered” (Kim, Y), as it brought its attention to the world. In the early 2000, Solo idols such as Rain, BoA, Lee Hyori, succeed in gaining an international recognition.

News/Web Sources
1) Healy, P. (2013). “Heartthrobs Rule The Korean Stage: K-Pop Stars Selling Stage Musicals in Korea” New York Times, New York. December 26. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/29/theater/k-pop-stars-selling-stage-musicals-in-korea.html?_r=0 The article discusses the exposure of theater and how it has changed drastically throughout the years. In the past, the sales of tickets relied on upon the measure of amount of awards the performer has won or if the music is originated from London or Broadway. In fact, today tickets are sold mainly because of the stars that are performing in the show. The thought of "k-pop" has turned out to be large to the point that they have not only attracted the locals, South Korea, but it starts to attract the people Japanese and Chinese onto being obsessed. Both K-pop stars, and Korean influential people, like the actors and actress are hired to perform a few times each week and are paid as much as fifty thousand dollars for every appearance. However, with that cash that are paid, the organization that takes control of the show earned more than the sales of the tickets.

Given the idea from Healy’s article, Korean wave doesn’t only represent the pop culture music, but it represents the popularity of Korean films and dramas. Idols that going globalized aren’t only singers, dancers and rappers, but the actors and actress that acts in movies and dramas are going globalized too. Fans are wiling to pay hundreds of dollars to watch their idols perform on stage, live. Some fans are even willing to pay air tickets to Korea for the sake of watching their idols perform live on stage.

2) Otmazgin, N. and Lyan, I. (2014). “Hallyu Across the Desert: K-Pop Fandom in Israel and Palestine.” Cross-currents: East Asian History and Culture Review. April 27. https://cross-currents.berkeley.edu/e-journal/issue-9/otmazgin-lyan Otmazgin and Lyan define the transnational dissemination of K-pop music outside of Korea, how Korean Wave, known as Hallyu empowers the fans. Their study feature fans played a crucial role as cultural mediators, as they are important in assigning new culture by playing a part in the process of distribution, reproduction, transnational penetration, genre and consumption of cultural commodities. In addition, they observe the ways how Korean wave keep up the fan cultures and the influence to the identification and formation of fans identities. In this research essay, the article makes a reasonable source of reference in understanding how the fan culture affects the consumption, production and dissemination of the Korean Pop culture, especially in explaining the widespread of the culture outside of Korea. The article is also useful in explaining how the fan’s culture are able to cross the border and outdo ethnic, political and social barriers.