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BTS’ global advancement and the formation of public criticism discourse on the Western racialization of Asians: Focusing on the communication in the reaction videos on YouTube

  • 탈경계인문학Trans-Humanities
  • 2022, 15(1), pp.167-204
  • DOI : 10.22901/trans.2022.15.1.167
  • Publisher : Ewha Institute for the Humanities: EIH
  • Research Area : Humanities > Other Humanities
  • Received : March 18, 2022
  • Accepted : April 16, 2022
  • Published : April 30, 2022

Eun-Ju Chung 1

1인천대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This article examines Western racialization of Asians reflected in popular culture through BTS’ case, and analyzes how racist representations poured on them are refracted and criticized in the YouTube reaction video space. I conducted a qualitative analysis of the communication in the reaction space, noting that in YouTube conventional audiences can become producers and play a role in forming participatory discourses. Western prejudice against Asians, especially Asian men, was projected on BTS who advanced beyond Western strongholds in the global popular music industry, where audiences in the reaction space talked and discussed that it was unfair to disparage their masculinity or the the values and artistry of their music. While reactors and viewers forming a critical discourse, BTS was also accepted as a model for dismantling the prejudiced representation of “Asians who lack creativity and are passive in civic activities as well as cooperation solidarity with people of other races”. Communications in the YouTube reaction space revealed that BTS’ advancement has cracked the Western hegemony over even the beauty and attraction, and contributed to break the framework of racialization in which various historical and cultural heritages within Asia are crushed into a single category of “Asia”.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.

This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.