Transnational K-Pop Fandom and Global Citizenship

The massive expansion of the internet has changed how people consume and interact with media, producing a class of media users who are highly literate in digital media. Popular culture fandoms are the prototypical example of such digital media users. Within deterritorialized digital spaces, media fandoms have taken on a transnational character, crossing national borders while consuming media, producing content, and engaging in collective action. Within these fandoms, where a sense of community that is based on shared taste is emphasized over national boundaries, encounters between people of different backgrounds and identities are commonplace. These transnational encounters have led to an increased emphasis on the awareness and attitude that is demanded of present-day global citizens. In this chapter, I examine the community of citizenship on display within K-pop fandoms, which are the most visible form of transnational fandom within the globally popular Hallyu culture. For this purpose, I examine the phenomena of individuality and collectivity, which are necessary conditions for yet also antagonists of community formation. By adopting this approach, I examine whether Korean popular culture, represented by the “K-” signifier, constitutes a sphere of transition facilitating the formation of a new mode of global citizenship.