Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (Part II)

Reminder: this is the second part of my piece for the "First World Congress for Hallyu" (October 2013). It had to be split into 3 parts to fit this blog's format. See Part I for the summary and 1st section, Part III for the 3rd section and final words.

Stephane

Get the PDF on Academia.edu.

 

***

Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave:

Summary

• Understanding wave dynamics – learning from nature
• Defining waves: always bear in mind that waves are disturbances
• Defining Hallyu: a simple wave, a current, or a vast ocean?
• Revealing a vast ocean in movement? Easier than carving every day the perfect wave

• Respecting cultural diversity – at home and abroad
• This is not a competition, this is not a “Clash of Cultures”
• Think nurturing beyond preserving: don’t build seawalls, grow mangroves!
• Diversity is the key to sustainability, ‘consistent’ doesn’t mean ‘constant’

• Nurturing an ethical, open, and fair ecosystem – showcasing cultural leadership
• Free creative forces across the nation and beyond, liberate time and space
• Economic leaders must act as true cultural leaders, open up and embrace change
• Most exposed at the crest of the wave, ‘cultural sectors’ must lead as role models

The spirit of Hallyu

© Stephane MOT - August 2013

***

II) Respecting cultural diversity – at home and abroad


Culture is about identity and community, codes and symbols that are not just meant to be preserved but ‘cultivated’, experienced, transmitted, assimilated, enriched and shared among humans.

A true cultural leader doesn’t destroy nature and its rivals. A true cultural leader is respected because he’s respectful of the whole ecosystem, of all cultures and all stakeholders. A true cultural leader respects cultural diversity at home and abroad, and he makes sure the ecosystem remains ethical, open, and fair.

a) This is not a competition, this is not a “Clash of Cultures”

Moments of contacts between cultures are not supposed to be conflictual. Let’s not transpose the so-called “Clash of Civilizations” imposture into a sterile “Clash of Cultures”, and let’s refer to nowadays intense “competition” in the media between regional or national cultures as a constructive “coopetition”.

This is not about being “the best”. Korean culture is already the best, at the same level as the American, French, or Dogon cultures. When one focuses on delivering the message that one’s the best, one misses the point, and only demonstrates a lack of confidence in their own culture. Being respectful is not a sign of weakness but a sign of confidence. To gain respect from other cultures, one must respect them as much as their own, on equal terms.

This is not about winning “market shares”, claiming new territories. What’s more important: Hangeul becoming the first alphabet to put the Cia-Cia language in written form, or Bau-Bau tribes joining the rest of the Indonesian community, as part of a nation that adopted the Latin alphabet decades ago?

Korea is typically acting as a cultural leader when it promotes young foreign talents along Korean ones for the ASYAAF (Asian Students and Young Artists Art Festival), or when it hosts a Korea-South Asia Culture Ministers meeting (September 6) and encourages international cooperation in Gwangju, site of the future Asia Culture Complex - to the condition of course that this relation doesn’t evolve into condescending patronization. 

Likewise, multiculturalism is a chance for Korean culture. Everything must be made to favor the integration of migrants and the assimilation of mixed kids in the community, but not with the intention to replace one with the other, and always keeping in mind the potential of enriching both cultures with new dimensions.

Opposing different dimensions of culture, for instance tradition and modernity, also undermines the cultural continuum to which they belong. Korea often suffers from what I call the “Wonjo Syndrom”: the original is so much protected that all originality is lost. For example: some great masters are considered as national treasures because they perfected the art of hanji or pansori, and that’s very positive, but they are deterred from trying something new, and sometimes too much protected, as if to prevent contamination from modernism. Yet to the contrary, they have the power to disseminate, to transmit a priceless heritage, to enrich both tradition and modernity. Their role shouldn’t be restricted to maintaining traditions, but extended to inspiring creativity: typically, they should be, from time to time, invited to meet with young designers, who can invent something new from a shared DNA. Korea already proves that it can combine the national/international and tradition/modernity as a cultural leader when it sends young Korean designers to Laos to meet with traditional textile manufacturers who have an original know how, but are not familiar with modern design: each party learns from the other without losing their identities.

Cultural issues can become conflictual, but at different levels, for instance at the commercial level (‘cultural wars’) or at the political level, when ‘Northeast Project’ revisionists claim that parts of the Korean culture (Goguryeo, gimchi…) belong to China. But then, conflicts shouldn’t denature culture itself, and the defense and illustration of the Korean culture should always remain positive, never tainted by nationalism, which opposes people instead of bringing them closer together, and ultimately harms Korean culture.

b) Think nurturing beyond preserving: don’t build seawalls, grow mangroves!

All waves face some resistance and eventually withdraw, sometimes taking more than they give. The negative impacts of aggressive waves are not only measured in terms of public image: fragile ecosystems can be wiped out, and new defenses be erected to protect the shores from the next tsunami.

The short-sighted have the reflex to build seawalls, the wise ones plant mangroves:

• “Seawalls” are protectionist measures that will stop all waves, but also block evolution (e.g. banning contents from one nation). That’s “tin-can preservation”: you can keep food on a shelf for years, but when you open the can, the food has lost all freshness, and never tastes like the real thing. Preserving identity remains important, but building walls between cultures, or within cultures, as we saw earlier between tradition and modernity, amounts to choking each ecosystem. Korea already knows very well where isolationism leads: Emperor Gojong bitterly regretted his “Soegukjeongchaek” (쇄국정책) policy that precipitated the fall of the Joseon dynasty. 

• “Mangroves” are natural defenses that also nurture the local ecosystem. They absorb the impact, and the ecosystem grows stronger, more resistant (because the protection comes from within, like an immune defense system), predictive of future changes. 

If Korea’s screen quotas or France’s “exception culturelle” are perceived as protectionist seawalls by the US, they’re actually mangroves guaranteeing diversity and spurring creativity everywhere. Hollywood lobbies against such measures, but ultimately benefits from them as well: without them, ‘Tinseltown’ wouldn’t be able to adapt or remake as many already tested concepts, source as many new talents…, and improve its own capacity to address diverse markets at home or abroad.

NB: Regarding the most particular case of North Korea, South Korea smartly softened its ‘seawal’l: it used to block all image from the North but now, media decrypt the propaganda, South Koreans measure much better the gaps, and they are much better prepared to face any situation in the future. Now if the North could do the same…

Food is typically a cultural domain where Koreans excel at creating new experiences at home and abroad, from street food to fine fusion dining. And even to Nanta, where it becomes a universal language. Inviting foreign chefs to discover Korean food and to adapt it, like in the Seoul Gourmet initiative, shows a willingness to share and to evolve in an open world. If you erect seawalls, your shores can’t be the place where cultures meet, where innovation and creativity blooms. Like in Montparnasse heydays, when artists came from Spain (Picasso, Dali, Miro, Bunuel), USSR (Chagall, Soutine, Zadkine, Orloff), Italy (Modigliani), Romania (Brancusi, Tzara), the Netherlands (Kees van Dongen), the US (Ernest Hemingway, Louis Armstrong, William Faulkner, Man Ray, Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound), Belgium (Django Reinhardt), Ireland (James Joyce), the UK (D.H. Lawrence), Japan (Foujita)… at the individual, national, and global level, culture progressed everywhere, including of course France (Matisse, Prevert, Cocteau, Poulenc…).

Korea has multiplied the occasions for foreign creators to come and meet, during festivals (e.g. PIFF) as well as for longer periods (e.g. artists in residence at the various Seoul Art Centers). Never have so many young and confirmed talents, Korean and non-Korean, roamed the country. Note that foreign students are another wonderful opportunity for Korean culture: within a decade their number grew from 3,000 to 100,000, many start their career or spend their most creative years in Korea, and all have the potential to remain ambassadors of Korean culture when they come back home or move to another country.

If creativity is infinite, our world is finite. All seas are connected, cross-fertilizing each other. They’re all part of a vast water cycle that sources and reaches everywhere. Just consider the epitome of Italian food, tomato pasta and expresso: tomato came from the Americas, noodles from Asia, coffee from the horn of Africa! Italians welcomed these ingredients to enrich their own culture, and to share with the rest of the World.

An exemplary nature is expected from Korea as it emerges as a cultural leader embracing diversity  and welcoming other cultures. We can be ambitious and confident, but never arrogant, and always respectful – typically, are we respecting multicultural Koreans as well as we should? And as a general “global warming” for Korean contents raises sea levels everywhere, it minimizes the efforts needed to promote them, but also increases the necessity for Korea to act responsibly.

c) Diversity is the key to sustainability, ‘consistent’ doesn’t mean ‘constant’

Like the wind for sea waves, media are the key factor for projecting to distant shores. Many nations are intensively promoting their culture and tourism, particularly across Asia (e.g. China, Japan, India, Korea, Malaysia…), and beyond classic advertising, they leverage pervasively on viral marketing innovations and social networks. But being ‘always on’ and consistent doesn’t mean being invariable and constant.

The capacity to sustain the effort in time and space is an advantage, but not a guarantee for sustainability: a seascape where all waves would always have the same amplitude and frequency would look not only fake, but also boring. People enjoy staying by the sea because it’s at the same time consistent and never quite the same, never fully predictable. Cyclical events of bigger amplitude help forge habits and nurture specific expectations, for instance when surfers anticipate the nth wave, or when tourists flock for events associated to high and low tides. Beyond that, each sea must have the power to surprise you sometimes. But if it surprises you all the time, only a minority of fans will keep coming. It can be useful to have a beach or two like that on your shores, but not all over your country if you aim at mass tourism.

Likewise, when all events and festivals enjoy the same level of hype and promotion, they all become non-events, and the noise breaks promising waves before they have time to grow. Proven successes and truly exceptional events need to be distinguished from the mass to help potential attendees take decisions. And in order to give a chance to every event, specific editorial lines must be developed for specific audiences.

An ocean cannot be carried by a single wave, even a popular one (and it shouldn’t, for the ecosystem’s sake). For instance, using K-pop stars to promote K-food might help K-pop fans get interested in K-food, but also make people who dislike K-pop despise K-food, if they happen to receive the message on mainstream media. Besides, Korean food has the potential to reach much further by itself, starting with food lovers who are generally not in the same demographics as K-pop fans.

Furthermore, audiences evolve. After years of TV domination, Hollywood managed to bounce back during the seventies thanks to blockbusters turning new generations into avid moviegoers. But the young Americans who came for E.T. or Star Wars grew up, and the industry had to design relatively more mature movies, sometimes coupling young stars with confirmed superstars, for instance Tom Cruise with Paul Newman or Dustin Hoffman (“The color of money”, “Rain Man”). Disco or Star Wars enjoyed another ‘mainstream’ period decades later but in between, only hardcore fans remained loyal all the way.

The Korean wave will grow much wider if it taps deeper into Korea’s rich and diverse cultural assets, not as one generic wave, but as thousands of messages of all shapes and sizes under a common umbrella, each one touching a relevant shore with the relevant impact. Exposure to the sun, the air, and new shores will also stimulate content creation in layers that didn’t have that chance previously, but may prove powerful.

Of course, the Great ‘Gangnam Style’ Tsunami of 2012 splashed across continents and demographics, and what started as a shallow parody made millions want to venture into deeper parts of Korean culture. But such ‘monster waves’ can never be repeated, and certainly not guaranteed on demand, when and where you need them. If PSY didn’t take the risk of going for something different, the risk he took was even greater: forcing direct comparisons at all levels with a phenomenon of unique proportions, that couldn’t be reproduced in a laboratory (let alone across the globe): ‘Gentleman’ did pass the 500 M views mark on YouTube – a remarkable success –, but also for a ‘mini-Gangnam Style’. Each new wave can strengthen the continuum if it is distinct from the previous ones, if it presents a different facet of the ocean.

A long but shallow horizontal wave is often less efficient than shorter but more focused slices that cut through deeper layers and target segments. “Verticals” can help specific audiences grow interest in Korean culture through relevant entry points. Beyond market verticals (e.g. teens, seniors, business travelers, honeymooners…) and content verticals (e.g. music, literature, movies, sports, food, tourism…), transversal themes are often used to pool all contents and options in order to better address specific needs, interests, or tastes (e.g. nature, adventure, party, culture and history, romance, health…).

Even when promoting one dimension of Korean culture, it is essential to display variations in rhythm, contents, to leverage all dimensions of that dimension... Again, this is a vast and diverse ocean in motion. And at the same time, you should always respect its identity, its soul. For instance, Korea shouldn’t been ashamed of its shamanic traditions, but accept them as highly valuable and differenciating assets, identity markers. Refusing diversity, showing only the polished and glamorous sides of a culture, that’s negating it and ultimately destroying it. An ocean without biodiversity is a dead ocean.

*

See also Part I and Part III.
 

*

Seoul Village 2014
Welcome to our Korean Errlines! Follow Seoul Village on Facebook and Twitter

Add this page to your favorites


* see "Heralding cultural diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (1st Congress - WAHS)"

Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (Part I)

I've been receiving a couple of requests every week about my piece for the "First World Congress for Hallyu" (October 2013) ever since I mentioned it* last year. I might as well post it here.

I'd been asked a paper on Hallyu and ethics, and seized the opportunity to raise the alarm on a few abuses, and to call for a better respect of cultural diversity. Clearly, as it is defined and marketed now, Hallyu can't survive long. And it shouldn't without a complete overhaul, because Korean culture as a whole can be hit as collateral damage.

There was so much more to say, but I was not going to write a whole book on this topic (well maybe I should, it would most certainly outsell my absurdist fiction).

Stephane

PS: it had to be split into 3 parts to fit this blog's format. See also Part II and Part III. Get the PDF on Academia.edu.

***

Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave:

Summary

• Understanding wave dynamics – learning from nature
• Defining waves: always bear in mind that waves are disturbances
• Defining Hallyu: a simple wave, a current, or a vast ocean?
• Revealing a vast ocean in movement? Easier than carving every day the perfect wave

• Respecting cultural diversity – at home and abroad
• This is not a competition, this is not a “Clash of Cultures”
• Think nurturing beyond preserving: don’t build seawalls, grow mangroves!
• Diversity is the key to sustainability, ‘consistent’ doesn’t mean ‘constant’

• Nurturing an ethical, open, and fair ecosystem – showcasing cultural leadership
• Free creative forces across the nation and beyond, liberate time and space
• Economic leaders must act as true cultural leaders, open up and embrace change
• Most exposed at the crest of the wave, ‘cultural sectors’ must lead as role models

The spirit of Hallyu

© Stephane MOT - August 2013

***

Heralding cultural diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave

Summary

Korea can fulfill its potential as a cultural leader, become a positive role model, and ensure durable success beyond short-lived fads. And because true leaders cannot be respected if they are not respectful, this cannot happen without understanding how wave dynamics work in nature, without a resolute ethical and sustainable approach of the ecosystem at home and abroad, and without embracing cultural diversity. Making more room for smaller players and indie creations, developing fairer revenue sharing models will not only ensure sustainability and benefit all players, but also help raise the nation’s image overseas.

I) Understanding wave dynamics – learning from nature

When you’re looking for ways to make a wave stronger and more sustainable, the natural place to start is nature itself.

Let us not venture into electromagnetic fields today: even if we’re living in a wireless and digital age, sea waves are much more familiar than sound or radio waves, and most people know what they look like, how they feel like.

a) Defining waves: always bear in mind that waves are disturbances

The first lesson nature teaches us, is that all waves are about energy that travels, actual disturbances, so it’s very important to keep in mind that even the most discreet wavelet can have both positive and negative effects, that respect is of the essence. Yes, waves do carry life and beauty, but as recent history reminded us, they can also bring destruction. And if tsunamis remain rare events, aren’t all shores being reshaped every day by simple, recurrent tides?

b) Defining Hallyu: a simple wave, a current, or a vast ocean?

How do we want Hallyu to be remembered: as a wave, as a current, or as an ocean? As an entertainment fad from the early 2010s essentially targeting younger generations (which can revive later and permeate popular culture, like disco for music, for example), as a special Korean way or flavor for a specific dimension of culture (like Bollywood for cinema, for example), or is Hallyu a generic term to define the whole Korean culture in motion?

The third proposition is not only the most ambitious, but also the most sustainable. And even the easiest to grow and maintain. More than a Korean wave that quickly rises and breaks, more than series of waves, people must realize that Korean culture is a vast and deep ocean, that each time they look at it, they only see the surface. A little bit like the tip of an iceberg, except nothing is frozen here. Everything is always moving, moving meaning perpetual movement as well as a wide range of emotions, strong as well as subtle. Waves are projected to help audiences see more of what’s inside, to help them crave for more, want to explore this vast but welcoming ocean by themselves.

Wave dynamics are as complex and unpredictable as success, but major waves always require large bodies of water. And parallels in factors of success can be drawn between sea waves and promotion / advertising campaigns, which also often come in waves (actually, marketing executive often use similar terms):

c) Revealing a vast ocean in movement? Easier than carving every day the perfect wave

Waves are not the purpose, but only means, elements of proof, each message revealing one facet of the same ocean. The challenge is to do justice at the same time to Korean culture’s vast diversity, and to its unique character.

Of course, no culture can be summed up in a few words: each culture encompasses countless dimensions (e.g. music, literature, language, arts, architecture, games, etiquette, sports, cityscapes, entertainment, tourism, fashion,…), and each dimension encompasses very wide spectrums (e.g. tradition and modernity, mainstream and underground, popular and elitist, slow and “bballi-bballi”, beautiful and ugly, made in Korea or overseas, made by Koreans, non-Koreans, mixed citizens…). And of course, no culture can be summed up in terms of products or marketing, no ocean can be branded. But somehow, you need to feed an umbrella brand, to highlight content verticals, and you can’t pretend to go far, let alone start any relevant campaign, without a clear and consistent strategic vision.

Diversity being a perquisite for all cultures, differenciating requires specific characters that makes this Korean ocean Korean. Is that “Jeong”? is that “Intensity”? Anyway that’s something as universal, timeless and far reaching as an ocean, not just some “segmenting” speciality which only will have a limited reach in terms of audience, time, or diversity, like K-pop (a wave, like disco) or K-drama (a current, like telenovela). But you don’t need to word these “characters” out: that’s neither branding, nor a slogan you dump after a few campaigns, and what matters is that the audience knows which ocean you’re talking about.

Again, the aim is not to design each time the perfect wave, but to reveal an ocean’s potential, from different angles. You can’t paint an ocean in motion by nailing reality at each stroke, and you feel much more comfortable when you keep the big picture in mind. The public doesn’t need to see everything, just to know that there is a lot to see, to crave for discovering more by themselves.

*

See also Part II and Part III.
 

*

Seoul Village 2014
Welcome to our Korean Errlines! Follow Seoul Village on Facebook and Twitter

Add this page to your favorites


* see "Heralding cultural diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (1st Congress - WAHS)"

First World Congress for Hallyu

When SEO Taiji's "Nan Alayo" resonates in the middle of the keynote speech, it dawns on you: this truly is a gathering of Hallyu scholars (NB: I owed this trip back to 1992 Korea to ethnomusicologist Keith Howard - SOAS, University of London).

But what does "Hallyu" cover, exactly? Answering the question seems to be the most complex task... or maybe I should write "tusk", since I heard at least two references to the old Indian tale of the blind men and the elephant - the one where each man touches a different part of the animal and describes something completely different from all others.

The organization behind this First World Congress for Hallyu, the World Association for Hallyu Studies, leaves definitions up to scholars, who are encouraged to explore all possibilities. WAHS itself is structured around the following sections: Humanities and social sciences, Korean language education and culture, Medical science, Hallyu policy and management, Sports science, Entertainment business, Tourism, Textile fashion and beauty science, and Food. So during the two-day event held on Korea University campus, topics reached far beyond the usual suspects (K-pop and K-drama*). As well as beyond WAHS's 18 regional branches, the 125 panel participants representing 24 nations and all continents (even Antartica was mentioned - by Stephen Epstein in his focus "below the Equator").

The purpose is not to push Hallyu overseas, but "to advance Hallyu Studies as a multidisciplinary body of knowledge and profession serving the public good" (as the mission statement goes), and ultimately peace and mutual understanding, as WAHS President PARK Gil-sung pointed out in his wrap-up remarks. Significantly, the Grand Prize for the Student Essay Contest was awarded to a Palestinian female student (Maysa Sameer), and the First Prize for the Article Contest went to Dredge Byung'chu Käng (USA) for his paper on "transnational transgender personification in Thai K-pop cover dance".

I wish I could have attended more panels in this rich program, but I'm glad I didn't miss the "Policy Makers" roundtable on the sustainability of Hallyu featuring representatives from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute (KCTI - Ministry of Culture), the Korea Foundation (KF), the Korea Creative Contents Agency (KCCA), the Korea Institute for Design Promotion, the Korea Foundation for International Culture Exchange, the King Sejong Institute Foundation, and KBS Hallyu Promotion Office. What started like a classic, digestive post-lunch series of presentations turned into a lively debate on the most relevant topic - Hallyu's sustainability - when KIM Tae-hwan (Korea Foundation) frankly shared his doubts regarding the future of what appears to be an overblown, short-lived fad marketed as an entertainment commodity, and his wish to see people work on more sustainable approaches. Participants also had passionate discussions around the roles of public diplomacy and of a government often accused of fanning the flames of international hype.

Day 1, Policy Makers Roundtable

Leveraging a network of 200 overseas missions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs collects all positive and negative feedback about the wave to produce a "Current Status of the Global Village" in partnership with the KF, which explains rather low-profile rethorics: yes we support the Korean wave, but we refuse the driver's seat; Hallyu should neither be politicized, nor be seen as a one-way phenomenon disrespectful of other cultures... The posture is less "we have the answers" than "we need to ask more questions": do we know Hallyu? do we overestimate it? do we have to broaden its scope?

The KCTI considers Hallyu as a content by itself, sustainability being only a matter of quality; it's neither in the hands of government, nor a question of public diplomacy, and the leadership is expected from the happy few top content providers... even if YG Entertainment, SM Entertainment, or Cube have more short term preoccupations, around their core activities (contents, convergence...). The KCCA's main worry for the future seems to be replicating the model on new markets, and KBS simply accompanies a dekoreanization process where Hallyu is not even seen as a part of Korean culture... 

Obviously, if the ecosystem seems aware of the need to embrace sustainability, definitions and forward-thinking levels differ a lot. Again, I threw in my two-cents on the issue the following day (see "Heralding cultural diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (1st Congress - WAHS)").

Note that the second WAHS congress will be held in Argentina next year, and that Israel will host a second Middle East - WAHS Conference in May 2014 ("The Cultural Geography of the Hallyu: Mapping the World through Korean Popular Culture", following "The 'Miracle' Narrative of the Korean Cultural Industries: Perspectives from the Middle East" - May 2013).

ADDENDUM - read my presentation "Heralding Cultural Diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave": Part I, Part II, Part III.

Seoul Village 2013
Welcome to our Korean Errlines! Follow Seoul Village on Facebook and Twitter

Add this page to your favorites

* or "Koreanovelas", as they are known in the Philippines (where they were initially aired in the local language, with Filipino names and soundracks).

Heralding cultural diversity: a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave (1st Congress - WAHS)

On Saturday 19, I'm participating to a panel on Hallyu and Ethics at Korea University for the First Congress of the World Association for Hallyu Studies. My paper is titled "Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave", and you can peek at the summary and menu below (bonus: you get an image because you're so kind!).

UPDATE 201404: NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE, SEE PART I, PART II, PART III

Of course I barely scratched the surface of the vast and diverse ocean of Korean culture* but that was the point: Hallyu won't go far if it defines itself as a wave; waves are only means, elements of proof that this ocean is vast, diverse, and alive. And culture is not just about cultural contents but also about how people live, use time and space, not just about cultural sectors but about society at large. 

So yes, good or bad urbanism or business practices also impact the way Korean culture is perceived: typically, Korea cannot herald creativity and diversity overseas if its urbanism negates them at home, and cases of abusive contracts and working conditions in K-pop industry exposed by Western journalists who came to investigate the phenomenon in Korea hurt much more than the classic criticisms denouncing a 'culture industry'. This year's agreement on a standard labor contract across the movie industry to end a long tradition of film crew exploitation marks an excellent trend, and my piece is optimistic because going ethic is not only the only option, but good business.

Learning from nature and wave dynamics: waves are a bit like the tip of the iceberg, except everything is moving (moving as in 'movement' and 'emotions', with an infinite variety of facets and paces). Note the vocabulary similarities with marketing campaigns, which also often come in waves.

Heralding cultural diversity - a stronger and more sustainable Korean wave:

Summary:

"Korea can fulfill its potential as a cultural leader, become a positive role model, and ensure durable success beyond short-lived fads. And because true leaders cannot be respected if they are not respectful, this cannot happen without understanding how wave dynamics work in nature, without a resolute ethical and sustainable approach of the ecosystem at home and abroad, and without embracing cultural diversity. Making more room for smaller players and indie creations, developing fairer revenue sharing models will not only ensure sustainability and benefit all players, but also help raise the nation’s image overseas."

• Understanding wave dynamics – learning from nature

• Defining waves: always bear in mind that waves are disturbances
• Defining Hallyu: a simple wave, a current, or a vast ocean?
• Revealing a vast ocean in movement? Easier than carving every day the perfect wave

• Respecting cultural diversity – at home and abroad

• This is not a competition, this is not a “Clash of Cultures”
• Think nurturing beyond preserving: don’t build seawalls, grow mangroves!
• Diversity is the key to sustainability, ‘consistent’ doesn’t mean ‘constant’

• Nurturing an ethical, open, and fair ecosystem – showcasing cultural leadership

• Free creative forces across the nation and beyond, liberate time and space
• Economic leaders must act as true cultural leaders, open up and embrace change
• Most exposed at the crest of the wave, ‘cultural sectors’ must lead as role models

The spirit of Hallyu

Seoul Village 2013

Welcome to our Korean Errlines! Follow Seoul Village on Facebook and Twitter

Add this page to your favorites

* and only a few issues raised in this excuse for a blog about it - e.g. for content verticals in"Saving Korean cinema... and even Chaebolplex", "Korean culture or Hallyu, Cultural contents or discontents", "DMC aims at Tinseltown - welcome to Hallyuwood !", ""...