Truth Collective

So this past semester at Boston College I did an independent study on the general topic of Asian popular culture. I started out reading up on topics like Bruce Lee, Japanese hip hop, and modern East Asian cinema, but I eventually found myself researching something that I’m a little more obsessed with (no offense Bruce!): b-boying. So if you are even remotely interested in the topics of Asian popular culture, South Korea, hip hop, b-boys, history, read on!! My apologies in advance for the shitty formatting and lack of citations. If you want to read more about these topics, check out some of the following.. a lot of the quotes in the paper are from these books, as well as bboyworld, style2ouf, and koreanroc!!

Hip Hop Hallyu: The Korean Wave and the Rise of the Korean B-boy

Introduction.
In TIME magazine’s 2007 poll of the 100 most influential people of the year, Korean pop idol Rain (Bi) was named as the second-most influential individual in the world with over 1.5 million votes, beating celebrities, politicians, and other notable individuals ranging from Stephen Colbert to Barack Obama. The Korean Wave of pop culture, a global trend that arguably began in 1997, has turned South Korea into a cultural production center, with its products being exported and consumed around the globe. An interesting development within the Korean Wave has been the rise of the Korean b-boys (breakdancers), who are unquestionably among the best b-boys in the world, dominating a dance style that originated in the Bronx in the 1970s. A decade ago, the South Korean b-boy scene had been in its infancy; during the relatively short period of time since 1997, it has grown into one of the most well-developed b-boy scenes in the world, supported in part by corporate and government interests. This paper will examine the history of Hip Hop and b-boying within the United States, b-boying’s paths of transmission to South Korea, its subsequent development, its place within the Korean Wave, and the broader implications of the rise of South Korean b-boy culture and the Korean Wave.

Part I. Genesis: Hip Hop in the United States
The end of the 1960s saw the assassinations of both Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. “The well of faith and idealism that had sustained the movements against the forces of rationalization and violence drained, and a lot of Black dreams – integrationist or nationalist – simply burned.” The South Bronx was literally burning; arson was widespread, with buildings being set aflame in order for landlords to collect money from insurance and copper pipes. Public housing was widely available in the South Bronx due to the unfavorable living conditions caused by the completion of the Cross Bronx Expressway in 1963; however, jobs were scarce, creating vast unemployment for the new generation of urban youth.

“…The South Bronx had lost 600,000 manufacturing jobs; 40 percent of the sector disappeared. By the mid-seventies, average per capita income dropped to $2,430, just half of the New York City average and 40 percent of the nationwide average. The official youth unemployment rate hit 60 percent. Youth advocates said that in some neighborhoods the true number was closer to 80 percent. If blues culture had developed under the conditions of oppressive, forced labor, hip-hop culture would arise from the conditions of no work.”

With nowhere to channel their energy, urban youths began to engage in criminal activities and radical political activism. Youth gangs became prevalent during the late 1960s, and youth movements were widespread, including the Black Panthers, the Chicano youth movement, and the Third World Liberation Front. However, there was an entirely new cultural movement that was about to emerge from the ghettos of the Bronx. In the summer of 1975, Afrika Bambaataa, a former member of the infamous Black Spades gang, began widely publicizing an organization called the Zulu Nation, the first Hip Hop organization, uniting Blacks and Latinos under the fellowship of a new culture. Under the Zulu Nation, the Zulu Kings would emerge as the world’s first b-boy crew.

The four elements of Hip Hop culture each emerged separately, eventually coming together to form the collective entity that is called Hip Hop. Clive “Kool Herc” Campbell, the Jamaican-born DJ credited with founding Hip Hop culture, coined the term “b-boy” or “break-boy” as someone who dances to the drum-heavy instrumental portion of funk records, known as the “break.” Like the other elements of Hip Hop, b-boying has its roots in poverty and deficiency. “Poor youth could not afford to go to downtown discos, nor did most DJs own their own club, so illegal improvised outdoor parties took place, with electricity provided by the closest street lamp.” Young b-boys would dance on bare cement, sometimes covered by cardboard or linoleum, which was originally discarded as trash. By the late 1970s, the b-boy movement had spread like electricity; it became so extensive that the cardboard packaging industry actually experienced an increase in the manufacturing of the product. While the influence of West African, Brazilian, Puerto Rican, Cuban, and Dominican Republic dance traditions on B-boying is undeniable, East Asian martial arts and Asian-American culture played a significant role in the formation of not only b-boy culture, but also Hip Hop culture as a whole.

An understanding of the cultural climate of the 1960s and 1970s is critical in understanding the influence of Asian and Asian-American culture on the formation of Hip Hop culture. During the most radical phase of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement, the model minority myth emerged within the American press, portraying Asian-Americans as an obedient, docile example to other minority groups who were openly fighting against oppression. Soon after in the early 1970s, the mainstream media had discovered the appeal of Asian culture to a mainstream audience, and was quick to appropriate and redefine Asian culture in a form that could be commoditized and sold to White and Black America.

“1974 was a breakout year for Asian popular culture in the United States. That year, ‘Kung Fu’ was the most watched show on television. The best-selling cologne was ‘High Karate,’ which claimed that guys would need martial arts training to fight off the ladies. And R&B singer Carl Douglas sparked a nation-wide dance-craze with ‘Everybody was Kung-Fu Fighting.’ This was the cultural landscape that surrounded the eventual founders of Hip Hop, so it’s no surprise that the ensuing music had a fair amount of far-east flavor. Witness early rap pioneer DJ Grandmaster Flash, 90s Supercrew, the Wu Tang Clan, and even today’s sample-jockeys who still go ga-ga for Godzilla.”

In the early 1970s, b-boying emerged directly out of the gang warfare of the Bronx in a symbolic representation of actual combat. “One of the wardances [of rival gangs] became known as ‘the Uprock’ … rivals lined up across each other, and went head-to-head – making as if they were jigging, stabbing, battering each other.” Although the b-boy scene was predominately Black at its inception, by 1975, Puerto Rican b-boys began to dominate the scene, reinventing and revitalizing the styles of the dance as well as the color of the b-boy. One of the primary influences of these early b-boy pioneers was the Kung Fu Wave of martial arts films that had risen to popularity in American society in the 1970s; B-boy DOZE of the legendary Rock Steady Crew describes this influence:

Every Saturday, me, Legs, Frosty and Kenny spent all day in the movies in Times Square. Three dollars for ten movies, some crazy shit! Just watch Shaw Brothers movies and just bug out. And so we started incorporating those moves into our dance. That’s how we started getting our own style … we used to just mimic people and act like a clown and do like Drunken Monkey style, like fall all over the place and come out – Boom! It was like, ‘Yo send DOZE in, clown him!’ I would clown him ‘Alright now send in Buck and Kuri.’ They were the secret weapons, boom baaaat! It was like 5 Deadly Venoms.

B-boy pioneer Ken Swift, in an interview with the Korean b-boy internet forum koreanroc.com, describes the influence of a Xia Brothers film on his choice of naming his crew the “7 Gems”:

I started the chapter called the ’7 Grand Masters,’ a throw back from a Kung-Fu cinema movie from the Xia Brothers Films called the ’7 Grand Masters’ and in the movie these people went around challenging people in the movie. Kung-Fu cinema played a big part in inspiring a lot of b-boys back in the 70′s. But to shorten it out, ’7 Gems’ … the gems that we possess deal with the history and the knowledge of the art forms of Hip Hop culture.

The genesis and evolution of Hip Hop culture in the United States allowed for a space in which a trans-ethnic identity could be developed, similar to the pan-Asian-American identity identified by Jae Hyup Lee, which encompasses all Asian-American ethnic groups as a reaction against external racial classification.

“Asian-Americans have begun gradually to act on a pan-Asian basis facing political and social situations. Despite interethnic and intraethnic differences, Asian-Americans as a group have common life experiences favoring the development of a pan-Asian identity. Moreover, as a racially divided nation, the United States encourages the Asian people the development of pan-Asian consciousness and culture … In developing pan-ethnicity, each Asian-American group de-emphasizes differences and rather focuses on similarities … In many ways, the redefinition of Asian-Americanness is a reaction to images or stereotypes imposed on Asian-Americans by the mainstream.”

However, Hip Hop culture goes further than creating a racially-defined identity: Hip Hop creates the possibility for a trans-ethnic identity to be developed that transcends racial classifications, in response to society’s classification of the participants of Hip Hop culture as marginal members of society. The Beastie Boys, a group of three white hardcore punk rockers from New York City, are a prime example of this trans-ethnic orientation within Hip Hop. After signing on with the record label Def Jam, the Beastie Boys blended their punk style with Hip Hop in their debut solo album Licensed to Ill (1986). “The uniqueness of Def Jam was its trans-genre orientation, particularly its fusion of rock, with Hip Hop’s African-based beat. The existence of Beastie Boys under Def Jam embodied the trans-cultural, trans-ethnic tendency of Hip Hop culture that had been well under way in the writers’ (graffiti) scene” in addition to the trans-cultural b-boy scene. In 1993, the Beastie Boys published the first edition of their Grand Royal Magazine after breaking with Def Jam. “As a counterstatement to Hollywood’s representation of Lee, the magazine chose Bruce Lee for the main feature of its very first issue. It proudly proclaimed the retention of Lee’s legacy from the Hip Hop cultural perspective: ‘Bruce Lee is on the cover because Bruce Lee is dope.’” The Beastie Boys’ choice to feature Bruce Lee reflects Kato’s insightful commentary on Hip Hop as a postmodern art form that draws inspiration from various sources, just as Bruce Lee did in his development of his martial art Jeet Kun Do.

As it happens, Bruce’s outlook was remarkably similar to that of modern day rap artists: ‘I don’t care where it comes from,’ he would insist. ‘If it is usable, it belongs to no one; it’s yours … From the beginning of Hip Hop’s development, before there was even a word to describe it, Hip Hop was about looking for the perfect break and juggling it back and forth on two turntables… And that perfect break could come from anywhere: Funk, Bebop, Classical, or Rock – any musician able to strike a groove for just a bar or two… It is a music made up of bits and pieces of preexisting sounds – looped, collaged, and layered until they take a new identity.

Nelson George, a Hip Hop scholar, also emphasizes the postmodern practice of cultural appropriation and assimilation commonly employed by Hip Hop: “It’s a postmodern art in that it shamelessly raids older forms of pop culture – kung fu movies, chitlin circuit comedy, ‘70s funk, and other equally disparate sources – and reshapes the material to fit the personality of an individual artist and the taste of the times.

In 1979, an unknown rap trio called the Sugar Hill Gang emerged as the first commercially produced Hip Hop group; beginning with the release of the single “Rapper’s Delight” (1979), Hip Hop had been picked up by the corporations, who tailored the culture to the demands of American consumerism, warping, cleaving, and molding the original four elements to create a marketable product.

Record execs realized there were potentially many more millions of fans out there for the music. The number of rap crews exploded, living-room fantasies fueled by platinum dreams. For the next decade and a half, hip-hop music moved away from the parks and the community center and the clubs and into the lab. Indie labels invested in researching and developing how to make hip-hop music, specifically rap, fit the standards of the music industry, how to rationalize and exploit the new product – how to find, capture, package, and sell its essence like a bottle of lightning.

As the disco era drew to a close in the late 1970s, mainstream America needed a new fad to embrace, and record labels were quick to cater to this demand. Kato sees the commodification of rap music from a postcolonial perspective: “One of the first signs of the corporate intervention and colonization of Hip Hop culture is the separation of rap from the totality of Hip Hop, which is composed of DJing, MCing (rapping), breaking, and writing (graffiti).” This separation of the original four elements allowed for the media to produce a tailored image of Hip Hop culture that could be exposed to and consumed by the masses, so that Hip Hop’s participant pool was no longer restricted to the disenfranchised groups that had created it. Dimitriadis (2001) notes this shift in the essence of the Hip Hop movement: “[E]arly Hip Hop performances were unique events, available only to participants, accessed only through participation. The art’s aura, its ritual-function so to speak, was a strong and defining one. Yet, with Hip Hop’s movement into commodity form and commodity culture, this aura evaporated. Rap texts became available to anyone, anywhere, to be put to multiple – virtually endless – uses. These texts become part of the ‘performances of the day,’ deployed moment-to-moment in multiple contexts of use, by often intensely disaffected young people.” An inevitable consequence of the commodification of Hip Hop culture was its globalization, which has produced countless brands of Hip Hop with both local and global characteristics in numerous countries throughout the world. In particular, South Korea’s Hip Hop movement has produced a large community of b-boys that are undisputedly among the most talented dancers in the world, posing a direct challenge to Western cultural hegemony through the domination of a Western-born style of dance. The South Korean wave of b-boying has coincided with the South Korean Wave of Popular Culture, which also has far-reaching implications for the patterns of popular culture consumption in Asia and around the globe.

Part II. Youth Countercultures in South Korea
The United States has been deeply involved with the internal politics of South Korea since the Korean War, a conflict that began in 1950 and remains a stalemate to this day. Youth movements, continuously met with resistance and repression from South Korean authorities, have been particularly influential in catalyzing change within the country. Syngman Rhee’s removal from power in the April Revolution of 1960 was an important step towards the establishment of a democratic system of governance in the country. Rhee’s overthrow was instigated by a mob of over 100,000 activists, primarily made up of college students and professors. They were met with armed resistance from the ROK army, leading to at least 115 civilian deaths and almost a thousand civilian injuries. Historically, the South Korean government has acknowledged the United States as a superior power and guardian; Second Republic Prime Minister Chang Myon hardly made “an important move without consulting the embassy and the Seoul station chief of the CIA.” The May 16th, 1961 coup d’état led by American-backed dictator Park Chung-hee made it clear that the United States was far more concerned with its own interests in South Korea than the establishment of a democratic system of governance and the interests of the Korean people: “in 1960-61 Americans deemed it okay for the ROK Army to put down Rhee’s street opposition, but not okay to put down a military coup that breached military discipline and the protocols of United Nations and American operational control over the Korean military.” Opposition in the 1960s was similar to that of the April Revolution, “namely, an elite protest by students, intellectuals, and remnant aristocrats.” These protests were often countered by teargas that was supplied by the United States to the ROK Army.

In addition to teargas, another American product began to trickle into South Korea during the 1970s: its popular culture. During this short period, “young Koreans in Seoul were being exposed to “Soul Train” and funk music via the U.S. Armed Forces Korea Network. A club scene arose in Itaewon to service American G.I.s. But as early as the summer of 1971, U.S.-backed dictator Park Chung-hee ordered his police to round up longhaired Korean men and cut their hair.” The Park regime actively suppressed any form of culture that was not seen as beneficial to Park’s ideology. Shin Jung-hyun, South Korea’s “Godfather of Rock”, was “jailed for four months in 1972 on alleged charges of drug possession after he refused to write a song glorifying military dictator Park Chung-hee. The military authorities banned his songs until Park was assassinated in October 1979.“

During the early 1980s, the commodification of Hip Hop in the United States spawned a variety of films that exposed Hip Hop to a global audience. Wild Style (1983) brought the elements of Hip Hop to Japan, sparking an underground Hip Hop movement and even a Japanese chapter of the Bronx-based Rock Steady Crew led by Tokyo B-boy Crazy-A. While Hip Hop was beginning to flourish in Japan, South Korea’s people were still being oppressed by military rule. On May 17th, 1980, following the assassination of Park Chung Hee by KCIA director Kim Chae-gyu, General Chun Du Hwan declared martial law in an effort to seize power. The resulting mass civil protests throughout the city of Kwangju were violently suppressed by military forces, resulting in more than 2,000 deaths by May 27th. “It was as plain as the nose on anyone’s face that the US was supporting Park Chung Hee and then his protégé [Chun Du Hwan], and it was much more worried about stability and North Korea than it was about democracy in the South … Kwangju just poisoned relations with the US [government].”

Throughout the 1980s, America’s popular culture gradually continued to permeate into South Korea. Particularly influential to the transmission of popular culture was the American Forces Network Korea, which was the only American television network being broadcast in Korea at the time. In 1984, the world watched as b-boys danced alongside Lionel Richie at the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics Summer Games; the same year, New York City Breakers performed at the 50th Presidential Inaugural Ball for Ronald Reagan, which was also broadcast on AFNK. DJ Soulscape describes how the AFKN first exposed him to American Hip Hop when the Korean Hip Hop scene was still nonexistent:

“In 1987, I saw the 1984 Grammy Awards on AFKN,” Soulscape explained the defining moment when he, just an elementy school student back then, fell for hip-hop. “Herbie Hancock and Grandmaster DST did an old school performance.” Transfixed by the Grandmaster’s futuristic scratching skills, the first grader started watching hip-hop music videos and digging up imported records by artists like LL Cool J. As a high school student, he worked part time at a convenience store to scrape together enough money to track down two turntables and a mixer. “I DJed alone in a bedroom,” he said. “There were no battles. There was no scene.”

Part III. Hallyu and the Korean Wave of b-boying
In 1999, the Chinese media first coined the term “Korean Wave” (Hallyu) in an article about an H.O.T. concert in Beijing, giving a name to the phenomena of South Korean cultural products invading the Chinese market. Prior to the Korean Wave, Japan was perceived by both East Asia and the West to be the center of Asian popular culture, with its exports of pop music, manga, and anime to the rest of the world. The disproportionate number of Chinese consumers, relative to that of other Southeast Asian countries, made the massive Chinese market a perfect destination for South Korean cultural exports; the Korean Wave has also spread to other East Asian countries such as Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, and Vietnam. While it is difficult to pinpoint the exact moment that the Korean Wave began, a watershed moment was in China, with the rising popularity of the Korean TV drama A Star in My Heart (1997), which expanded to other forms of cultural products, such as music, films, and games. The incompatibility of Chinese and American culture plays an important role in the Chinese market’s choice to consume South Korean popular culture; the Chinese market is constantly in need of cultural products that embody the achievements of modernity.

“We feel that we can see a modern lifestyle in those shows,” said Qu Yuan, 23, a student at Tsinghua University in Beijing. “We know that South Korea and America have similar political systems and economies. But it’s easier to accept that lifestyle from South Koreans because they are culturally closer to us. We feel we can live like them in a few years.”

Another student at Peking University describes how South Korean cultural products act as a substitute for American cultural products as well as Japanese cultural products. Japanese popular culture is viewed as unacceptable by the older Chinese generation, due to memories of Japan’s colonial history.

Jin Yaxi, 25, a graduate student at Peking University, said, “We like American culture, but we can’t accept it directly … And there is no obstacle to our accepting South Korean culture, unlike Japanese culture,” said Jin, who has studied both Korean and Japanese. “Because of the history between China and Japan, if a young person here likes Japanese culture, the parents will get angry.”

Im Jin-mo, a Korean critic of popular culture, affirms the sentiments of these young Chinese regarding the consequences of China’s tumultuous history with Japan as well as China’s relationship to the United States.

First of all, China is ideologically opposed to the United States. A sense of nationalism operates against the United States. It’s the same with Japan. When the younger and older generations in China hear the word “Japan,” they feel an inward hostility… Korea is entirely different. First of all, there is no sense of competitiveness with Korea. That doesn’t mean that the Chinese look down on Korea; they view Korea as a country to learn from … In a situation in which the United States and Japan are both disliked, Korea becomes the logical choice for China’s affections.

However, Cho Hae-Joang interprets Chinese sentiment towards the Japanese in a dynamic context: “With increasing cultural exchanges across national borders and the internalization of consumer society, which must continually find things that are new and different to appeal to consumers, the younger generations have already divested themselves of such consciousness around national borders.” An article from NPR asks, “Is this simply canny branding? Or is it an attempt to forge a pan-Asian identity to compete with mainstream U.S. culture?”

In Japan, the fanatic success of the TV drama Winter Sonata (2002), primarily among middle-aged women, has fascinating consequences for not only South Korea’s popular culture industry, but its tourism industry as well; “the number of Japanese who traveled to Korea in 2004 recorded a growth of 35.5 percent compared to the previous year … the number of Japanese tourists who travel to the shooting locations of Winter Sonata have rapidly increased, particularly since the end of 2003, and most are women.” The example of Kozumi Yoshimura’s fantasy of the ideal Korean male reveals the influence of the Korean Wave on the imagination of the Japanese:

“South Koreans are so sweet and romantic — not at all like Japanese guys, who never say ‘I love you,’” Yoshimura said as she waited for her blind date, a single Korean man, in the 50th-floor bar of a chic Tokyo skyscraper. A telephone operator who lives with her parents in Hiroshima, she has spent thousands of dollars on her quest for a Korean husband, flying to Seoul 10 times in the past two years and bullet-training to Tokyo for seven blind dates with Korean men.” So far, though, she hasn’t found the one she’s looking for. “Maybe I’m living in a fantasy world,” she said, pouting her blood-red lips. “Maybe I’m looking for the TV stars I can’t really have. But we are all allowed a dream, aren’t we?”

The international economic situation was the primary catalyst of the Korean Wave; the Asian financial crisis of 1997, which was met with an economic bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), drove South Korea into a severe depression and brought about a shift in the country’s economic perspective. “Once Koreans became aware of the flow of various forms of capital around the world- financial, investment, and speculative – they threw themselves into that world created by full-blown capitalism.” South Korean b-boy culture emerged during the early 1990s, echoing the genesis of Hip Hop culture in the Bronx three decades earlier:

The kids that really got involved in [b-boy culture] during that particular period were the kids who would’ve been hit hardest by this particular recession. At that particular time, Korea was leading the economic crises in drops in currency … these kids were all working class kids … for them, they saw this particular counterculture as a way to be able to express themselves, to be able to almost drop out of society in a way, to go down to the park to find other crews to battle, to sort of do their dances and that kind of stuff, and to create this whole sort of subculture was really important to them at this particular period, in some ways it’s not so different from 1977 London with punk or 1973, 1975 in the Bronx.

The Korean b-boy culture began as a grassroots youth movement, made possible by the lessening of government repression of youth cultures, which allowed for an increase in the availability of both local and international media. In 1992, the pop group Seo Taiji and the Boys performed simple b-boy moves in their dance choreography, which gave the South Korean society a taste of the b-boy culture. Other pop stars followed suit, incorporating b-boying into their choreography as well.

Jou Hyoung-il, a member of the pioneering People Crew, relates the humble beginnings of the Korean b-boy movement in a club called Moon-Night in Itaewon, a city in close proximity to Yongsan Garrison, an American military base. Moon-Night is hailed as the “Mecca of b-boying” in Korea, and reveals the bottom-up process by which the Korean b-boy culture was built.

“To talk about how Moon-Night came to be, we first got to know that there [wasn’t] much space for the b-boys to fool around and dance … from the late ‘80s to the early ‘90s Moon-Night didn’t play the popular songs. There weren’t many dancers or singers at the time, so there couldn’t be many popular dance-songs … The music genres played at the time were New Jack Swing and Soul … but the people who could dance were limited so, like a trend … Moon-Night caught people’s attention with rumors. With rumors spreading that there are people who dance really well, naturally dancers came to this place … first, they see each other dance and later, come to be friends. After that it naturally came to be called the Mecca of b-boying.”

Jou Hyoung-il’s group, People Crew, was particularly influential in helping to spread the dance to the Korean mainstream. In 1996, Jou joined People Crew, a Hip Hop team commonly profiled as a pop group, but actually consisted of members who practiced all four elements of Hip Hop culture. People Crew became the first commercial group to expose b-boy culture to a broader Korean audience, putting out three albums between 1999 and 2002.

Video footage from abroad played an essential role in the development of the Korean b-boy scene, primarily footage from the United States and Japan, where the underground Hip Hop scene was thriving. Hip Hop promoter Chon, a Korean-American member of the legendary Circle of Fire crew based in Seattle, tells of an instance in which he had given a videotape of the 1995 Los Angeles b-boy competition Radiotron to members of the Korean b-boy crew Expression while in Korea on a family vacation in 1997: “A year later I came back and I just saw there were more b-boys. They were telling me, ‘Oh you gotta see this footage.’ I’m watching it and it’s the Radiotron [video] that I brought out a year ago. It’s been dubbed so many times the screen is shaking.”

Jou Hyoung-il also emphasizes the importance of video footage from abroad in helping Korean b-boys to develop their style of dance, sometimes through blatant imitation of the foreign b-boys in the footage.

You have to know that clips and information were really precious. When a video came in, you hid it and watched it by yourself … Woo-Sung’s father went to Harajuku, Japan and at that time he filmed the Japan Rock Steady Crew and brought it back with him … one day when I met Woo-Sung at Moon-Night I stopped him and … I asked [him] for a copy of the clip. After a few days Woo-Sung brought the video and I got to watch it. It was really fresh and I was satisfied. But this is a story I later found out: … while copying the tape he would cut off the important parts. The reason was that he was going to use the moves. But if other people watched it they would also use it. He hated that.

B-boy Virus of Teamwork Is Perfect, the oldest b-boy crew in Korea, recounts his experience of learning to dance by watching footage from various sources, both local and international, which included the infamous Radiotron footage:

Between 1992 and 1993, there was no [b-boy] footage available. I just recorded the Korean musicians that came on TV, and that was my reference. One day, I ran into AFKN (American Forces Network Korea, the only U.S. television channel back then), and I watched a show called “Soul Train”. Occasionally, I witnessed b-boys there, and I learned from that. When I was 17 years old, I was exposed to L.L. Brothers and Imperial footages from Japan, but what shocked me the most was Radiotron ‘95 … the moment I saw Ivan, that’s when my blood started boiling.

The evolution of b-boying within Korea has been rapid since 1997, considered by many to be the “year zero” of b-boying. During that year, a graphic novel named “Hip Hop”, written by Kim Su-Yong, showcased b-boying to an even larger audience. The internet has also been a central factor in the rise of the Korean b-boy scene, as South Korea is one of the most digitally connected countries in the world; the internet has enabled users from all around the world to watch footage from other countries, as well as share footage with the rest of the world. The initial phases in the development of the Korean scene consisted primarily of imitation, but a uniquely Korean brand of b-boying would eventually emerge in a process that paralleled the formation of other forms of Korean popular culture, which were initially also blatant imitations of American and Japanese pop culture. According to Cho Hae-Joung, plagiarism is a driving force behind the process of global modernization:

The Korean ballads were imitations of Western music while most of the Korean dramas were clearly copied in many aspects from those of the American and Japanese. In a way, the South Korean cultural industry succeeded in creating their version of the products through quickly copying Western blockbuster films and Japanese comedies and dramas. However, in the global modernization process, most subcontractors eventually make their own brands. Modernity is a history of imitation, and one should not deny or underestimate the power of ‘copying.’

By 1999, Korea hosted its first international b-boy competition, the International Hip Hop Festival, which brought b-boys from abroad into the country to compete, including the Rock Steady Crew, Circle of Fire & the Style Elements Crew from the United States, Bag of Trix from Canada, B-boy Connection from France, and the Spartanic Rockers from Japan. The International Hip Hop Festival was the first time that South Korea’s b-boys would compete against b-boy crews from outside of the country, and a Korean all-star team was established for the occasion, advancing to the semi-finals of the event. Korean society, however, was not yet ready for the b-boy movement; B-boy Virus recounts an episode that exemplified the public’s perception of b-boys.

“Back then, the prevailing public consensus of Korea was very hostile to B-boys. In their vision, B-boys were punks. The people who did standing dance hated on B-boys, too. They were saying, “Ah, you are really good at mopping the floor with your body”. One time, we had a cypher circle going on, and someone threw in trash, calling us bums and what not. They just could not appreciate it, saying that it has no soul or no feelings attached.

A watershed moment for Korean b-boying occurred at the 2001 international Battle of the Year (BOTY) competition held in Germany, an annual event established in 1990. In 2001, Korea’s BOTY representative Visual Shock took the title of “Best Show,” and came in fourth place after losing a battle against an American crew, HaviKoro. Visual Shock’s trip abroad was the beginning of the international Korean Wave of b-boying; the next year in 2002, Expression Crew represented South Korea at BOTY and took first place. From 2002 to 2008, South Korean crews have won either first or second place at BOTY, in contrast to the United States, which has not made it to the top four since 2001, when HaviKoro defeated Visual Shock to win third place. In a symbolic defeat of U.S. cultural hegemony, Korea’s Gamblers crew won The B-boy Hodown competition in Texas in 2006, the first year that the event opened up to international competitors; Gamblers’ manager Choi Ji-hun noted, “It’s meaningful that Gambler won the competition upon its first invitation, showing South Korean B-boys’ world-class capability.”

One of the primary reasons that Korean b-boys are able to realize their world-class capability is rooted in Korea’s history: the mandatory military service required by all South Korean males, a consequence of the stalemate between North and South Korea that has lasted the greater part of a century. Most of Korea’s prominent b-boys have not received a college education, as they view dance as their most marketable skill. According to Mr. Byun, the manager of the BOTY 2005 champions Last For One, “Korean b-boys seem very powerful, but within the structure of Korean society they are actually very weak. These guys know dance as the only way to experience joy in their lives, so they desperately just want to dance … they are all poor and a few are from families that would be considered in extreme poverty.” For professional Korean b-boys, military conscription almost certainly means an ending to their dance career. In the words of b-boy Darkness of the Gamblers, “You lose everything you worked for when you go to the army. Like any professional athlete if you take a break, you lose all your skills.” For many Korean b-boys, postponing the service seems to be their only viable option.

The service will come up when you’re 21, 22. But they can always extend that using some excuse,” Chon says. “A lot of the b-boys — now they’re like 26, 27, they haven’t gone. They have to go soon. They keep putting it off because the culture is kind of peaking now.” He estimates that four out of five b-boys currently competing in South Korea have postponed their service or have illegally evaded their conscription. Chon and Shin say they know many b-boys who have mutilated themselves to dodge the army. Kim “Bang Rock” Hyun-jin of the Rivers crew says through a translator, “Everyone tries to avoid the service.” Then he switches to English for emphasis. “It’s like going to hell.”

Because of the looming reality that their b-boy careers will eventually end when they enter the military, Korean b-boys push themselves to practice at another level. According to B-boy Bruce Lee of the Gamblers, “Dancing is not allowed in the army. Period. So we’re willing to go to the extreme before we’re drafted … We start practice at midnight and go home by 5:30 or 6 am… unless we have a performance the next day, which means we don’t sleep!” According to Benny Ben of Rivers Crew, being a b-boy in Korea means devoting your entire life to the dance: “When you choose to become a b-boy in Korea you’re basically letting go of all the other lifestyles you would have had. Most of the b-boys don’t really finish high school or go to college, [and] dedicate all of their lifetime to dance, to b-boy. I think that’s why we’ve had the time to push b-boy level to the next level.”

According to Lee Yong-hi of the B-boy Association, “B-boy dancing caught on after 2000, when local teams won at international competitions … Companies and viewers alike are paying attention to B-boys.” There was also shift in the way that b-boys were viewed within society, and an enormous increase in economic opportunities available for top ranking b-boys. Speaking about the period after Gamblers won BOTY in 2004, B-boy Bruce Lee states, “The way people treated us totally changed. I’m embarrassed to admit it, but our fees went up a lot.” Corporate sponsorships for top b-boy crews, as well as local and international performance opportunities, became more widely available. After winning B-boy Hodown in 2006, Gambler “[embarked] on a performance tour to Vietnam, Hong Kong, and Mongolia. Ahead of this, Gambler signed a 100-million won (US$100,000) contract to become commercial models for Korea’s Kookmin Bank. They were also invited to perform in Beijing on the eve of the 2008 Olympics.” Gamblers also have sponsorships with Fila and Enerzen energy drink, and are scheduled to star in the upcoming movie Hype Nation (2009), “the latest in the Hollywood dance-ploitation genre.” Aside from being impacted by commercial interests, the Korean Wave of b-boying has also been shaped by the shift in government policy towards cultural products in Korea that followed the economic restructuring of the IMF bailout.

Motivated by the phenomenal success of Korean popular cultural products abroad, the government designated ‘cultural technology’ (meaning the technologies that produce television drama, film, pop music, computer games, animation, etc.) as one of the six key technologies along with IT and BT (Bio-technology) that should drive the Korean economy into the 21st century, and pledged a huge amount of financial investment and administrative support to domestic cultural industries. For this cause, the government established the Korea Culture and Content Agency in 2001, with a budget of US$90 million for that year.

Since 2001, the Culture and Content Agency, which has gone through its own series of restructurings and is currently known as the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST), has taken on an active role in sponsoring b-boying in Korea to the extent that no other government agency in the world ever has. Being supported by both the Korean government and the commercial culture industry has allowed South Korean Hip Hop promoters to organize world-class competitions, in turn reaping great profits for the Korean government, as well as captivating the world’s attention.

The Korean government — through its tourism board and the city of Suwon — invested nearly $2 million in [the 2008 R-16 b-boy] competition. Two of the most successful teams, Gamblers and Rivers, have been designated official ambassadors of Korean culture. The R16 competition, held at the Olympic Sports Complex, is broadcast live in prime time in South Korea and dozens of other countries. The government expects to gross $35 million from advertising and TV rights this year.

Korean-American b-boy Donny, a member of the Boston-based Florox Crew, recalls his visit to Korea for the 2008 Evolution: Korea competition, particularly his surprise at the level of organization of the competition, as well as the skill level of the competitors. “The whole level of seriousness is on a different scale. The b-boys that I practiced with in Korea were considered not too serious, but in America they would be the top-level b-boys here, in terms of effort and the amount of hours spent practicing. The hardcore dancers have a level of dedication that I’ve never seen. At jams, they were a lot more organized. American jams never start on time. The Korean jam that I went to ran like butter, the crews that were getting knocked out would have won jams in the states, to give you an idea of the level of b-boying there.”

In supporting South Korea’s b-boy culture, the MCST has bridged the gap between the so-called “high arts” and popular culture. B-boying has gained legitimacy as a performing art within Korean society, with the establishment of the B-boy Theatre near Hongik University in Seoul, the first performing arts center in the world designated especially for b-boy performances. Since 1997, South Korea’s performing arts sector has garnered international acclaim, beginning with the success of the non-verbal performance Nanta, whose audience count surpassed the 1-million mark in September of 2006. In addition to boasting a record audience, Nanta has also become the first show from Asia to perform an off-stage musical on Broadway in February of 2004. Designated as one of the ‘Top Ten Things to See in Seoul” by the Korea Tourism Organization, Nanta incorporates elements of salmulnori in a fusion of modern and traditional Korean culture.

Performance agencies across Korea are realizing the potential that b-boying has to showcase to an international audience. The breakthrough show The Ballerina Who Loved a B-boy, a performance that incorporates elements of both ballet and b-boying, sold tickets priced at 50,000 won at the B-boy Theatre. Thirty percent of the attendees are foreigners, reflecting the reality that Korean b-boys have become a tourist attraction. The Korean Tourism Board’s 2008 campaign, Korea Sparkling, as well as its previous campaign, Dynamic Korea, have utilized b-boys in its commercials to portray the dynamic, youthful image of Korea that the agency wishes to project to the rest of the world. In October of 2008, performances of The Ballerina Who Loved a B-boy began at 37 Arts, an Off-Broadway theatre in New York City, the birthplace of Hip Hop. Other non-verbal b-boy performances include “B-boy Korea, created by the agency that represents Nanta, as well as Picnic, the management agency of Jump,” a nonverbal performance based on Tae Kwan Do. In showcasing b-boying as a national attraction, the possibility of incorporating traditional Korean elements into b-boying while still retaining the authentic essence of b-boy culture becomes an important issue.

“Already, there are several concepts that combine B-boy dancing with traditional instruments or comic drama, but most industry experts are assuming a wait-and-see attitude about whether these efforts can capture that new and special something of the original charm of B-boy culture. There are also those who worry that if these fads fail to exhibit a new form of artistry, this could well result in a loss of the opportunity to transform the exceptional talent of Korean B-boys into high value-added performances on the world stage.”

B-boy Born of Rivers Crew, also a member of the U.S.-based Zulu Kings, sees Korean culture and Hip Hop culture as fundamentally incompatible. “We are a crew that sticks to tradition … We don’t put in a Korean flavor. Hip-hop doesn’t jive with Korean sentiment. Korea has a hierarchical system, so you can’t really express yourself, you have to be really careful.” Rivers Crew MC Superman Ivy echoes this sentiment: “There are no Korean elements … The rhythm is different. There is nothing one can do about it.” However, many other Korean b-boy crews have expressed their national identity through b-boying. In their 2005 performance at BOTY, Gamblers’ performance represented the history of Korea, with their crew being split into two sides in a battle symbolic of the Korean War, eventually reconciling and finishing their routine as a unified Korea. Last For One has also performed with the Seoul Traditional Orchestra, incorporating traditional Korean music into b-boy dancing. In addition, Drifterz crew has also incorporated salmulnori into their performances. These are just a few of many examples of Korean b-boys incorporating traditional Korean cultural elements into their dancing in an expression of nationalist identity. Seo (2002) views the Korean Wave as a product of Korea’s cultural heritage of music and dance, which produces a uniquely Korean brand of dance music:

“Even though we derive our dance music from America or Japan, it is inevitably colored by Korean sensibilities during the process of copying. The reason that the Chinese are crazy about our music is not because our dance artists and singers created the music with the Chinese market in mind. The music that the like is the music that we created for the domestic Korean market- that is, music reflecting a Korean sensibility and sung in Korean… we are probably the only nationality that enjoys dancing on tour buses … Some people say that the Korean Wave is the product of “B”- grade cultural capital and that it should not represent our cultural character… Those who created the Korean Wave are not the people who create the so-called “high” or traditional “Korean culture,” nor the classical music played by Koreans. The Korean Wave derives from Korean dance music, which we like so much that we treat it with contempt.”

The Korean Wave, including the wave of Korean b-boying, has far-reaching implications for the future of South Korea, as well as for the Asian continent and the flow of culture across the globe. One interpretation of the Korean Wave is that it represents a shift in global cultural power, a direct challenge to Western cultural hegemony. Kim Myun Hee (2001) talks about the possibility of a “Korean Dream” as dialectical to the “American Dream.” According to Prof. Jim Dator, director of the Research Center for Future Studies in the University of Hawaii at Manoa, South Korea has emerged as the first “’Dream Society,’ an economy that sells dreams … the image of the Korean Wave by wrapping it as a commodity.” Sociologist Song Ho-keun of Seoul National University views Korean b-boying, within the context of a postmodern society, as the manifestation of a greater trend, a rejection of the traditional notion that work and leisure should be separate. Song predicts that this trend will bring South Korea into a post-industrial era, in which “soft” cultural products will generate greater wealth for the nation.

Young Koreans are releasing the explosive energy of postmodernism, characterized by their rejection of standards, group action, uniformity and regulations, more than the young people of any other nation. The B-boys, avatars and e-sports have one thing in common: they collapse the boundaries between work and play. The younger Korean generation are creating wealth while enjoying themselves. They carry the world’s strongest potential in terms of postmodern competitiveness, turning sensual delight into added value. A new “soft economy” era will follow the era of industrialization.

Im Jin-mo questions the authenticity of the Korean Wave’s cultural products, viewing the creation of a pan-Asian cultural identity as far more important than the creation of a Korean culture industry; for Im, the Korean Wave is an opportunity to overcome Western cultural hegemony through the birth of a new cultural wave based in China, which will have far broader implications for the global balance of cultural power.

Although Japanese jazz has received some attention, that hasn’t translated into increased sales or other forms helpful to the cultural industry. Meanwhile, hits from Europe and America are spilling into Korea everyday… What China undoubtedly dreams of doing is transforming itself into a ‘global cultural center.’ For China, it is not just about escaping the status of a cultural colony; it is about becoming a cultural center. China is waiting for the day when it can control the world’s cultural flows not politically, but as a cultural superpower. For China, Korea is a stepping stone towards this goal. If China emerges as a new cultural furnace, it will mostly likely mean East Asia’s emergence from cultural colonialism … We need to view the Korean Wave not in terms of market expansion but as an opportunity to establish an identity. There needs to be a serious debate as to whether we have our own unique cultural code and grammar, whether ballads are really Korean music, and whether TV dramas are really creative… Through the Korean Wave, we must create a sense of cultural solidarity with China and use that position to raise the status of East Asia vis-à-vis Europe and United States.

The example of South Korea as a cultural production center for the rest of Asia will undoubtedly bring about a change in global awareness, as well as interesting possibilities for the future. “The non-Western people who have so far confirmed their existence only through the West are finding new opportunities to construct an alternate consciousness through the sharing of popular culture.” Both Korean b-boying and Korean popular culture have dominated the rest of Asia during the period known as the Korean Wave, but this trend will not necessarily be permanent. The success of the Korean Wave can be attributed to myriad factors, with a particularly important issue being the “culturally empty space left by enormous changes that swept through China in 1990. In the confusion, the marketing strategies of Korean companies in China had the good fortune of hitting their targets, creating the Korean Wave.” In the future, social, economic, and political conditions could allow for the advent of a Chinese Wave, a Taiwanese Wave, a Vietnamese Wave, or numerous other possibilities. Speaking about the cycles of the international b-boy scene, American b-boy pioneer Ken Swift says: “The world is a big place, man, and there’s another hungry competitor stepping up … it’s a cycle, and the cycle is based upon crews like these Korean crews who go out and inspire these new fans. And then five years from now, those new people are going to be saying, ‘OK we’re the shit now.’” Meanest Cat of Happy Soul crew from Taiwan describes how Taiwanese b-boys had looked up to Koreans in the past, and are developing their own skill level at a rapid pace. “Look at Formosa Crew versus T.I.P. in Battle of the Year 2008. They’ve looked at [Korea] as their goal to beat and recently they’ve caught up. It’s only a matter of time until Taiwan will be better than Korea.” When this mentality is applied to the world of popular culture, the possibility of new cultural production centers on the Asian continent is an exciting prospect, and seems to be the direction in which the world is already headed.

Tags: b-boy, globalization, hip hop, korea, korean wave Share on Facebook