Asian Popular Culture - Essay Example

Asian Popular Culture The Asian Popular Culture also known as Asian pop culture may refer to the contemporary lifestyle, cultural activities, and products that reflect the general taste of the wider Asian population (Fung 1). Indeed, the Asian population is wary of the generally accepted norms that define the lifestyle, cultural activities, and commercial products in the Asian region. The Asian Popular Culture integrates is under the influence of other popular cultures that reside within the Asian region and other interrelated regions (Fung 1). Indeed, since the 19th century, the western culture has been influencing the western culture. This has an ultimate effect of developing the contemporary Asian popular cultures in accordance with the Western values. The development demeans the identity and effects of the Asian Popular Culture. The popularity and significant effects of the Asian Popular Culture is evident in Asian countries that include Japan, Korea, China, among other nations (Fung 3-5). This paper defines how Asian popular culture relates to processes of regional integration and globalization. It is worth noting that the Asian Popular Culture has been growing in the last two decades in East Asia through the advancements of cultural activities and commercial products in the regions. Indeed, the advancements in information technology have fostered the growth of the communication and media sectors. This is clear in the increased production capacity of media cultures like pop music, TV production, films, and other theatric ventures in East Asia. Moreover, Asian pop culture is alive to the synchronization of the media culture markets, which fosters the processes of regional integration as the media culture markets are in different regions within the Asian continent. Indeed, more people in the region can now access information on Asian pop culture, which enhances the development of points of unity and integration. The development of the production capacity of media cultures like pop music, TV production, films, and other theatric ventures in East Asia allows many residents in the region to experience and identify with the characteristics of the Asian pop culture. Another aspect that fosters unity and integration in the Asian region is the capacity of the media personalities from the region to carry out their activities across the national borders. Indeed, producers, directors, actors, and operating capital apply in different nations across the region (Iwabuchi 1). In the recent days, the media culture producers and directors have been establishing partnerships with different personalities across the region creating a sense of integration (Iwabuchi 1). Indeed, the Trans-Asian promotion and co-production of the Asian pop culture in form of collaboration and partnerships among media and cultural industries from different countries in Asia enhance regional integration in Asia. The partnerships and collaboration between different media personality promote the sharing of media cultures thus creating a common identity that depicts regional integration. Moreover, the producers and directors that develop the Asian pop culture come from different nations within the region. Ideally, the Asian Popular Culture incorporates different musical instruments like drums, electric guitars, pianos, bass instrument, vocals, and flutes (Education Services Australia Ltd 1). These instruments are fundamental in the creation and presentation of commercial music that depict electronic and synthesized effects, which forms the Asian pop culture that defines the regional identity in Asia. Most assuredly, the commercial produced music fosters regional integration and globalization by allowing for the use of Asian musical instruments and western musical instruments. For example, the Chinese pop music enables all traditional Chinese instruments to collaborate with popular instruments of Western cultures (Zhu and Rosen 1-6), which allows for the transfer and sharing of media cultures between Asia and Western nations (Education Services Australia Ltd 1). This is a clear definition of how Asian Popular Culture influences regional integration and globalization. With the sharing of music instruments in creating and presenting commercial pop music, Asian Popular Culture opens a leeway for a common cultural identity. Various scholars derive a clear correlation between pop music and popular culture in all regional settings including in Asia (Miklitsch 3-8). Worth noting is the fact that pop music and popular culture are dependent of one another and seek to represent the cultural activities, lifestyle, and commercial products of a given region. In this context, pop music and popular culture have a common purpose where they relate to fashion, performance, digital/screen/print media, visual arts, language, communication technologies, and youth consumerism (Education Services Australia Ltd 1). Indeed, the music, art, cultural norms, visual arts, performance, and dressing in Asia are unique and represent their culture. Different countries with the region adopt the same music, art, cultural norms, visual arts, performance, and dressing with an urgency to satisfy their cultural expectations. Indeed, most Asians have a unique way of performing their arts, singing, and communicating which defines cultural integration in the region. The recent industrial growth in Asian countries like China and Japan has boosted the reference economies. Notably, the entertainment industry is seemingly one of the industries that benefit a lot from the increased industrial growth in Asia. Indeed, various entertainment companies are camping at China and Japan with an aim of recruiting and training young men to join the mission of spreading the Asian Popular Culture through songs, performances, art, and fashion. This leads to an increase in the Asian economy as more people identify and afford different aspects of the Asian culture. The Asian pop culture will probably expand to different regions across the globe as various Korean entertainment companies concentrate on Chinese celebrities seeking the Chinese market (Education Services Australia Ltd 1). The residents gain economic wealth, higher purchasing power, and higher standards of living, which allows them to interact with economic trends across the globe (Education Services Australia Ltd 1). Indeed, with increased economic strength, populations in the Asian region can connect with populations from other regions, which define regional integration and globalization. Through the interactions, populations across the globe can share the cultural activities and commercial products, which manifest how Asian Popular Culture influences globalization in the modern society. However, it is worth noting that the sharing and transfer of the Asian Popular Culture comes at great costs and follows different courses. In most cases, we have the Asian Popular Culture adopting the cultures and trends from the west. The spread, adoption, and influence of the Asian Popular Culture equally depend on globalization. For instance, the personalities promoting the Asian Popular Culture who include musicians, artists, dancers, and arts industry celebrities must establish a good link with the Asian countries that host the pop cultures. Such personalities can travel to the Asian countries from different regions to seek a better understanding of the unique styles and artists, music, and fashion trends entailed in the Asian Pop Culture (Iwabuchi 2-6). Such travels play a huge role in promoting the understanding, coherence, and integration of the residents, which defines globalization. As such, it is clear that globalization and the Asian Popular Culture depend on one another. For many years, the Middle East especially the Southwest Asia region has been facing serious stability issues. This region suffers from the lack of security and integration. This raises the need for regional integration to address the security issues in Asia since the instability equally affects other nations through globalization. To achieve this Asian Popular Culture enables the residents of this region to find a common cultural activity and commercial product that helps them to integrate by adopting the unity of purpose (Miklitsch 8-17). Individuals sharing the same popular culture recognize the need to establish a stable nation, pursue peace, and avoid confrontations. Various mediators who come from different regions to advocate for security manifest globalization and the need for regional integration. Furthermore, the media cultures broadcast the plight of the unstable Asian countries and call for help where necessary As such, it is clear that media globalization as seen in Asian Popular Culture, fosters regional integration which enhances productivity and establishment of regional interactions in East Asia region. While addressing the Asian Popular Culture, we can specify the Korean popular culture in East and Southeast Asia regions. Notably, the Korean popular culture has been recording immense popularity in the recent past. The immense popularity of the Korean popular culture also refers to Hallyu, or the "Korean Wave" (Center for Globalization Studies in an Urban World 1). The Korean Wave relates to the cultural activities and trends that begun in the early 19th century in China and Japan, then gradually spread to other Asian countries and further on to other continents. The wave represented the spread of Korean popular culture across the globe, which defines globalization. The Korean Wave entailed various cultural activities and commercial products that defined the Asian pop culture. Notably, the Korean Wave entailed Korean-identified television dramas, movies, internet games, fashion, and popular music (Min 1). Although, the wave started with the Korean TV dramas, it progressed to other regions where it incorporated music ("K-pop") and movies (Center for Globalization Studies in an Urban World 1). The spread of the wave manifested globalization as it appeared in in mass media reports that discussed their popularities in China and Japan and expanded to several countries in Southeast Asian region (Center for Globalization Studies in an Urban World 1). With time, the popularity of the Korean Wave continued to increase in Asia as well as in other countries across Europe, the United States of America, and other regions. The increased popularity of the Korean Wave sparked global debates. Indeed, the continued success of the wave across the globe led to huge global criticism regarding the Asian Popular Culture and forced many academicians to focus on the popular phenomenon. These concerns define globalization as various scholars established diverse attitudes regarding the future of the Korean Wave and the entire Asian Popular Culture. However, there is a common agreement that there is more to the Korean Wave since it has the capacity to develop and improve international cultural relationships (Min 1). The capacity of the Korean Wave to foster international cultural relationships manifests how Asian Popular Culture abhors globalization and derives regional integration as people from different regions engage in defined cultural relationships. Indeed, the Korean Wave has the capacity to contribute to East Asian cooperation with respect to international relations. This is manifest where various Asian countries have been contemplating the idea of developing a union named Asia just like the European Community that represents the integration of European nations and their interests. Indeed, in the recent times, the Asian popular culture have convinced the Asian countries that they need to establish peaceful interactions between themselves for them to overcome the dynamics of globalization. In addressing globalization, it is evident that the dissemination of pop culture in East and Southeast Asia by Japan has a great effect on globalization. Indeed, the Japanese popular culture revolves in Asia, which plays a major role in decentering globalization processes (Iwabuchi 1-5). Ideally, Japan fosters significant cultural interactions with other nations in Asia, which complicates its position in the region where it is seemingly similar but superior to other Asian nations in the region. Japanese pop culture has the capacity to repackage Western pop culture for Asian consumption and influence regional cultural resonances. Popular culture and the transnational flows of people and products within and outside of Asia depend on one another. The two affect each other in diverse ways and the cultural, economic, and political relationships between Korea, China, and Japan can clearly define this dependence since the three nations have a long history in Asia. Korea and Japan has been having close economic relationships since 1965 but their historic and political relationships are conflicting where they seem to prejudice each other’s operations up to today (Jung 1). Indeed, the Korean government only lifted the official ban on the direct import of Japanese cultural products in 1997. Prior to this time, the two countries had minimal exchange of the popular culture. However, with the contemporary Korean popular culture, globalization, and lifting of the ban various types of Japanese cultural products entered Korea via legal and illegal modes (Jung 1). Such products included popular music while the movement of people to Korea included travels, abroad studies, business, and immigration. In discussing the relationship between pop culture and transnational flows of people and products within and outside of Asia, it will be relevant to address Korean products. Notably, the cultural interactions between Korea and Japan defined the Korean Wave that played an important role of boosting the image of Korea with which Japan had a similar cultural tradition and a close historical relationship (Lee et al. 1). This portrays how transnational flows of people and products within and outside of Asia depended on popular culture. However, many Korean scholars and the popular Korean press have been ignoring this transnational cultural interaction between Korea and Japan for many years (Jung 1). With relation to the Asian context, popular culture relates to the media-entertainment industries and diverse cultural phenomena that define modern media technologies (Yang 1). The East Asia region is developing many transnational flows and cultural relationships where the society-induced regionalization processes motivate such relationships (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 1). The sharing and transnational flows of Korean pop culture products in East Asia region have significantly enhanced the social interactions between Koreans and others in the region, which defines the new regional integration. Some of the Korean pop culture products that flow within and outside of Asia include Korean dramas, movies, and popular music. A significant population in the East Asia region identifies and consumes the Korean popular culture products though not all East Asians consume the pop culture. However, it is quite notable that the young generation consumes the greater portion of Korean popular culture products (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 9). Since the late 19th century, there has been an increased transnational flow of Korean pop culture products in East Asia (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 2). The Korean wave defines the consistent and growing popularity of the Korean pop culture products in East Asia. The Japanese fever preceded the Korean wave also known as the Hallyu in the late 19th century in the region (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 2). The popularity of the Korean wave depicts the pertinence of Korean transnational flows (Bejarano 1). Transnational flows of people and products within and outside of Asia forms the basis for increased globalization in the East Asia region. The flow of people who go to Korean for further studies, travels, business, and immigration defines the transnational flows in pop culture. Most studies focus on the transnational flows of people into Korea and the media and cultural aspects of the Korean Wave while very few studies address the increased transnational flows of Koreans to other countries within and outside of Asia (Bejarano 1). Maybe the most sober explanation to this discrepancy is the fact that the transnational flows of people into Korea and the growing popularity of the Korean wave derive significant effects on Korean tourism. Indeed, the Korean wave and the movement of people to Korea increase Korean tourism outside Korea and tourism from Japan to Korea. The Korean tourism depends on the popular culture and the transnational flows of people and products within and outside of Asia. The great number of Japanese tourists that came to South Korea defined the influence of the Korean Wave on the transnational flow (Bejarano 1). Initially, Western nations were the favorite destinations for Japanese tourists. However, popular culture inform of the Korean Wave diverted this transnational flow of people where most Japanese tourists begun to visit Korean Wave dramas in South Korean sites. This defines how popular culture affected transnational flow of people within and outside Asia. The Korean wave has managed to maintain Korea as the most favorite tourist destination in Asia where countries like Japan have huge tourist interests in Korean thus leading to improved Korea-Japan relations (Bejarano 1). In fact, the increase in popular culture is fundamental to the growing Korean tourism outside Korea where the South Korean government reduced the restrictions on Korean tourism (Bejarano 1). In absence of the improved Korea-Japan relations fostered by popular culture, transnational flow of people within and outside of Asia would have been challenging. The tourists coming to Korea from South Korea derive huge financial benefits and help in addressing various societal and political issues affecting Korea and the Korea-Japan relationship. Moreover, the prominence of the Korean Wave exposes global issues that emanate from transnational flows of people within and outside Asia. This helps in establishing regional integration and globalization as populations interact peacefully. The mapping of Asian, East-Asian, and South East Asian identities equally depends on the Korean tourists who follow the Korean Wave (Bejarano 1). It is therefore very clear that the transnational flow of people within and outside of Asia. This leads to various effects that include increased Korean tourism and financial benefits that emanate from the increased number of tourists coming to Korea. Moreover, the reliance of transnational flows on popular culture leads to improved Korea-Japan relations and greater opportunity to expose and address the diverse issues affecting Asian, East-Asian, and South East Asia (Bejarano 1). However, this was only possible because the Korean government lessened the tourism restrictions subjected to other countries. Furthermore, there was a correlation between Korean pop culture products and transnational movement of products within and outside Asia. In this case, the Korean pop culture products include Korean movies, music, drama, rituals, food, and medicine among others. The Asians watch the Japanese and Korean pop culture products as they search for cultural proximity in Asian TV programs (Chua and Iwabuchi 1-5). Indeed, various studies establish that populations from within and outside of Asia have a significant urge for cultural proximity in TV programs (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 3). This is a deviation from the initial trend where populations had a desire for a Confucian East Asia (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 4). The current transnational flow of products defines the East Asian popular culture, which is generally acceptable in the East Asian popular culture. The change from the Confucian East Asia to the modern East Asian popular culture enables the audience to concentrate on urban and middle-class lifestyles as well as helping them to integrate with East Asian characters that grace the Korean movies, music, dramas, and TV programs (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 4). Indeed, various studies assert that East Asian audiences’ identify with the Korean popular cultural products upon watching the Korean dramas, movies, and TV programs. The transnational flow of products within Asia defines the Korean popular culture where the East Asian audiences’ relate with their colleagues within the region by viewing the Korean dramas or movies. This is evident where the scenes and lifestyles in such movies reflect the daily realities and dreams of the audience. This defines the cultural proximity that populations from within and outside of Asia seeks in Korean TV programs. Indeed, the Korean drama, Jewel in the Palace is one of the TV programs that many East Asian people view with a guarantee of deriving cultural proximity. This emanates from the fact that the Jewel in the Palace drama entails various ingredients of traditional Korean culture, the rituals, food, and medicine. This defines the negotiations and conflicts between Confucian values and modern urban lifestyles offered by the East Asian popular culture, which most East Asians reckon (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 7). As such, popular culture relies on transnational movement of Korean products to satisfy the East Asian cultural proximity needs. Furthermore, transnational flows of products rely on popular culture to develop imaginary Asian modern femininities where Chinese female viewers prefer Korean dramas subject to their good mixture of pure love and social realism in the modern platform (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 8). This is a complete deviation from the traditional values. The East Asia audiences’ experience improved and better images upon using Korean pop culture products as compared to the negative images experienced in Japanese pop culture products subject to its social and political problems (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 8). As such, popular culture depends on transnational flow of products to show a clear representation of the reference country featured in the commercial products. Through the pop culture, East Asians derived an understanding on other population in the region. The Korean dramas and movies depict a positive image of Korea and Koreans (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 8). Modern media technologies played a major role in enhancing the transnational flows. Notably, different regions experience transnational cultural flows in varied ways where the bilateral cultural flows in East Asia define such experiences. For example, the movement and promotion of Japanese popular music and television dramas in Hong Kong defines the transnational movement of Japanese products to Hong Kong in a Japanese pop culture context. Moreover, the movement of Asian popular culture to Japan depicts a different way of experiencing transnational cultural flows. The Winter Sonata drama manifested the significance of the transnational flows of products between Japan and South Korea (Center for Globalization Studies in an Urban World 1). Indeed, the drama drew huge number of tourists from Japan to South Korea motivating the South Korean government to promote its filming locations as tourist sites (Chua and Iwabuchi 71). This establishes a clear and positive relationship between the Korean pop culture products and transnational movement of people from other regions to Korea portraying the nation as a favorite tourist destination (Inter-Disciplinary.Net 10). Works Cited Bejarano, Shalmit. Panel IV: Global Perceptions of Korea through Hallyu. 2014. Web. 28 May 2014. < http://www.korean-studies.org.il/conference/panel-iv> Center for Globalization Studies in an Urban World. Globalization and Popular Culture: Selected Themes. Web. 28 May 2014. < http://globalizationstudies.sas.upenn.edu/node/526> Chua, Beng, and Koichi Iwabuchi. 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