I am very interested in the effect that music can have on the interaction between different communities, especially within the context of hip-hop and R&B, as there is a lot of give and take (both acceptable and unacceptable) between the African and Asian diasporas. Crystal S. Anderson’s Hybrid Hallyu: The African American Music Tradition in K-Pop focuses on questions of cultural appropriation in K-pop artists’ use of elements from hip-hop and R&B.
“The 1980s and 1990s witnessed a shift from the repressive regime of Park Chung Hee, South Korea’s last dictator, to a more democratic and culturally tolerant environment ushered in by Kim Young Sam in 1992. Rhythm and blues and hip-hop represented musical traditions that spoke to the creative possibilities opening in Korean society” (292). The shift to R&B and hip-hop seems somewhat natural to me, as I understand songs from both genres to (usually) generate from real-life experiences of suffering and oppression. In thinking about how artists often use creative expression to speak out against their respective societies, I thought about the 2004 song “Dear America” written by Psy and N.E.X.T. which has very anti-American lyrics related to war. In a CNN article, Psy said the song “was part of a deeply emotional reaction to the war in Iraq and the killing of two Korean schoolgirls that was part of the overall anti-war sentiment shared by others around the world at that time.” According to the article, the girls were struck and killed by a U.S. military vehicle. https://www.cnn.com/2012/12/07/showbiz/psy-apology-irpt/index.html
Much like how the debut of groups like Seo Taiji and Boys heavily contrasted “healthy songs,” I can imagine the emergence of Korean R&B and hip-hop to be considered “rebellious” at the time, especially within the context of a post-dictatorship society.
While the development of hip-hop and R&B in Korea (and other communities) seems natural, I find the execution of it questionable at times. As he is one of the only Korean artists I know of, I will use Dean as an example. Dean’s single “love” (feat. Syd of The Internet) “sounds” very R&B:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkNB5AsgZOc&ab_channel=COLORS
“Rhythm and blues and hip-hop are black musical genres, not because of who performs them, but because the genres themselves contain elements that reflect black aesthetics” (291). I personally do not see any obvious cultural appropriation in this song, especially because it is a collaboration between Korean and African American artists. I often feel that a song’s meaning and/or the artist’s intentionality behind the song can signal cultural appropriation, like in the current case of Ariana Grande and her newly developed sound / aesthetic. Dean’s lyrics and performance are universal, so I do not think his existence as an R&B artist is a problem.
In the reading, Anderson states: “Similarly, the authenticity of Korean artists’ use of hip-hop is measured by how closely they conform to a U.S.-based hip-hop defined by discrimination and racism” (294). Is this just because United States society is more diverse and might consider discrimination like racism more than Korea? Additionally, I would like to further explore the topic of diversity and originality in K-pop (and music in general), as I have been interested in these topics for a long time and am also taking a class called “Afro-Asian Cultures” which considers the interaction between the African and Asian diasporas. In the dance community, there is a parallel debate about the use of the term “urban” when describing dance styles, as the term does not credit the origins of moves/styles and therefore can be considered an appropriation of the dance style’s culture.
The Politics of K-Pop 