One-way ticket?

After reading Sung Kim's paper about backlash against Hallyu, I thought about the question of whether or not the Korean Wave is a "one-way" cultural and economic exchange. Kim quotes Samuel Kim saying that Korean production companies in China give the impression that they are only interested in exporting goods and do not share their "know-how" with locals. I was slightly confused by this because their "know-how" was not really explained but I assumed it meant their marketing and prodcution techniques. At any rate, why would Korean production companies want to share their strategies with local Chinese production companies which are international competitors. This is more of an example of modern capitalism than a way to justify the notion that the Korean Wave is a "one-way" exchange. I would argue that Hallyu is not simply 'Korean popular culture' clearly penetrating foreign markets for a variety of reasons that we have discussed throughout the semester.

From post modernist theories we learned that we can not think of Korean pop culture as something stable and singular in meaning. We learned about cultural quotation in pop music in particular so Korea often exports music that quotes foreign styles. Furthermore the meanings of songs are not created through production alone. Individul consumers approach and consume popular culture in different ways depending on their individual preferences and/or country of origin.

Sang-Yeon Sung's paper for example talked about how the youth in Taiwann have been notoriously discriminative towards Korean popular music. The paper mentions that Korean lyrics are difficult to listen to but that the Taiwanese valued lyrics greatly. There is no doubt that Korean production companies have had to modify their products to make them more consumable. This illustrates that Korean pop culture is not simply imposed on foreign consumers. There is in fact a give and take relationship between the two parties involved. It is a cultural battlefield in a sense where this constant negotiation and a multiplicity of meanings.