Popular Culture Final Examination

Gangnam Style: In-Depth Video Analysis

Anais Anais (2009120015) Rita Herliani (2009120019) English Department Sampoerna School of Education

Gangnam Style: In-Depth Video Analysis

Korean wave is a recent global phenomenon that has turned into a popular subculture among many young adults and teenagers around the world (Delson, 2012). It is the boom of Korean culture that started in the late 1990s. The early Korean wave was about Korean Soap operas and movies. Then, the second Korean wave is more focused on K-pop (Korean Pop song). K-pop is mostly composed of idol group singers. They are good-looking, the songs they sing are easy to listen to and to sing, and the performances or dances they showed are often fascinatingly accurate (Lim, 2012). The first Korean wave was more focused on Asia, and the second Korean wave was popular in Europe and the United States. For instance, in June 2011, SM Entertainment hosted a concert in Paris. The concert was very successful and 15000 tickets were sold. In fact it was sold-out within ten minutes. Because of popular demand, SM extended the concert for one more day and the tickets were sold-out again as fast as they were the first time. Within the explosive popularity of Gangnam Style, the Korean wave has suddenly become the hot topic again. Its October 2012 and for the first time in history, the whole world seems to have a brand new catchphrase which is Gangnam Style. The Korean rapper, PSY, has been catapulted to stardom by a YouTube clip that has spread to all corners of the globe. As of the very first day of October, the single Gangnam Style has soared to the number one position of the charts in Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Greece, Belgium, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Chile. It is currently in second position on the US charts and is a top five hit in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Austria, Switzerland and Portugal. In short, the song is a worldwide hit.

Park Jae Sang, known as PSY, is a Korean hip hop artist under YG Entertainment. He was born and raised in a wealthy family in Seoul. PSY came to the U.S. to study management at Boston University and later continued to study at the Berklee College of Music. He graduated from neither, yet learned to synthesize American electronic beats into Korean pop while eliminating the Asian innocence and Western cynicism. He debuted in January 2001 with his full-length album titled "PSY from the PSYcho World! for which he later had to pay fine due to accusations saying that the album contains inappropriate contents. Since then PSY has become a controversial artist as his second album was even banned in 2002. Moreover, this controversial artist has been busted for marijuana and purposely avoiding the country's mandatory military service (Fisher, 2012). However, he gained much fans with his style of music and his sense of humor. He launched himself into an international stardom through "Gangnam Style," the song that he wrote, composed and produced by himself. Gangnam Style may seem cartoonish, but the song is deeply intertwined with the Korean political and socio-economic structure (Turzi, 2012). Gangnam district, which is south of the Han River, and Gangbuk district, which is north of the Han River are the two places that provide the source of Gangnam Styles deeper meaning. Prior to the 1970s, Gangbuk was the heart and soul of Seoul. For approximately 600 years it has been the home of kings and queens of the Joseon Dynasty and of South Korean presidents. It also is home to an enormous amount of cultural heritage found in monuments, historic places and museums. However, this began to quickly change in the 1970s when Gangnam, more known as a rural area of cabbage and pear fields, began its massive residential and commercial development. Since then Gangnams enormous growth has created an economic and social flip-flop between the two districts. Now, it is the home of some of South Korea's biggest brands, as well as $84 billion of its wealth, as of

2010 (Lee, 2012). That is seven percent of the entire country's GDP in an area of just 15 square miles. A place of the most conspicuous consumption that might called as the embodiment of South Korea's one percent. This area surrounds wealthy, beautiful, and stylish residents with a concentration of trendy nightclubs, fancy restaurants, and upscale shopping centers. They own and display every status symbol like, driving around in a Mini Cooper and flaunting Louis Vuitton handbags holding their iPads and iPhone, while sipping a Starbucks latte. They are a global, techno-cool class, the newly-riches in emerging countries. PSYs Gangnam Style song and video is not about sexy ladies and riding horses, which everyone seems to think (Bloomberg, 2012). Instead, it pokes fun at so many who are chasing rainbows and dreaming of becoming a Gangnam resident someday, much like those wanting to live the Hollywood lifestyle. PSY has succeed satirized what it means to live Gangnam style which are being unreservedly materialistic, unconditionally individualistic, and utterly consumerist. In the video, there are two dominant visual themes which are horses and sunglasses. In South Korea, horses are nowadays a key trademark of the rich. Due to the dearth of land, the ability to buy into a country club with enough land to support a stable, let alone trails and fields to practice recreational horseback riding, implies exceptional affluence. Therefore, the horsethemed video may be an exhibition of the wealth that Gangnam citizens are purported to have. The sunglasses may just be a reflection of the pretentiousness that is inherent in the Gangnam style. Throughout the entire video, even in the scene where he meets his lady love, PSY never shows his eyes, the supposed windows to the soul. Thus, this deliberate choice in costuming may be a statement about how Gangnam style refers to a superficial outer shell, without any substance or soul.

The aesthetics of the video are intentionally bizarre and ridiculous (Barry, 2012), because PSY wants to show the inanity of Gangnam style itself. Those parodical narrative of the entire video is a succession of events that underline the ineffectiveness of pursuing a life of luxury and superficiality. The music video begins with PSY seemingly sunbathing on sandy beach, being fanned by a hot chick, but it turns out he is surrounded by little kids playing in the playground. Then, theres PSY walking together with two girls just like walking on the red carpet but in fact, he and the girls are in an outdoor parking lot and, instead of confetti, tens and thousands of pieces of trash are thrown at them while the fake snow keeps flying into their faces. Then, what appears to be an upscale swimming pool is in fact public baths. He is pictured sitting on a fancy chair that turns out to be a toilet. You can see horses throughout the video clip, but PSY only rides the ones on a merry-go-round. There are luxury cars, but he dances in a parking lot. He seeks to be part of the nightlife high society, but he ends up dancing on a bus. Finally, he meets the woman of his dreams in the subway, rather than at an exclusive club. All those parodical scenes completed by the parodical theme of the song, dress classy, dance cheesy that reveals material hoarding is a hollow meaning for existence. Taking such a high-class look and bringing it down to this level of comedy is saying that people are all the same no matter what they buy or how they dress. This message reaches all the way over people obsession with physical attraction and fancy belongings. Some people pour countless dollars to make their skin brighter, teeth whiter, waists thinner and on expensive brand name clothes thinking that is the key to happiness. They can try and cover themselves with dollars and diamonds, but in the end we are all human and strive to be happy in some way or another. While many reach out to their possessions for a temporary fix, the true secret to happiness is much easier to find. It is being satisfied with yourself and appreciating the simpler things in life.

Gangnam style mostly demonstrate capitalistic behavior with the pursuit of materialism or the pursuit of form over function (Fisher, 2012). As explained before, Koreans might made an extraordinary gains as a country, in terms of GDP and everything else. However, that growth has not been equitable. Thus, Koreans or even other citizens in the world might coming to the realization that gross domestic product gains do not necessarily result in commensurate gross domestic happiness.

References

Barry, Robert. 2012. Gangnam style & how the world woke up to the genius of K-Pop. Online: http://thequietus.com/articles/11001-psy-gangnam-style-k-pop. Bloomberg, A. 2012. Gangnam style tells an economic truths. DaCapo press: Singapore. Delson, R. 2012. Gangnam style: missed meaning and ethnic message. Chicago Ethnic community press: Chicago. Fisher, Max. 2012. Gangnam style, dissected: the subversive message within South Koreas music video sensation. The Atlantic publishing: Atlanta. Lee, Christine. 2012. The Hallyu wave finally arrives in America. Englander press: England. Turzi, Mariano. 2012. The many meanings of Gangnam. Buenos Aires press: Torcuato.