K-Pop & Hyper-Consumerism: A Colorful Chaos
Min-Ji is a 19-year-old college-going student during the day and an ardent K-pop fan during the night, with a modest inclination towards the BTS. One of the strongest proofs of her craze for K-pop is her dorm room at the University. The room is covered with posters and photo frames of BTS members. More than University books and supplies, the shelves in her room are decked with BTS albums. More than her family photos, there are photos of J-Hope, a BTS member. She is an avid K-pop fan who purchases their merchandise wherever she goes. Her mission is to buy all products of BT21. BT21 are characters created by the BTS members that have made Min-Ji a fanatic for these products. Many Min-Jis are in the corners of the World 'consuming' their favorite K-pop band’s products and flying across the World to watch their events. This craze makes a bystander wonder what it is about K-pop, the Korean popular music industry that creates such a massive fan following all over the globe! The present article explores the above.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits remixing, adapting, and building upon the work for non-commercial use, provided the original work is properly cited.