A brief round-up of recent hallyu and nationalism stories.
- Rain’s producer, Park Jin-young, says the word “Korean” should be removed from “Korean Wave”.
“I don’t understand why the Korean wave is taken as the rah-rah material,” Mr. Park said. “Now is the time to overcome nationalism, but instead we are intensifying that sentiment.”
- Park has a similar message in the Chosun. Mark Russell has a good post about it here.
- The Korean women’s speed-skating team apologize for their impromptu protest about the ownership of Mount Paektu. Follow some of the Marmot’s links for the background. There are some fun photoshops of the protest here and here
- And on the subject of disputed territory in the North of Korea, some rather old news on how Korean TV dramas on Goguryo are providing topics for discussion with China. The Korea Times, here and here, with Andrei Lankov here.
- Meanwhile, the Hallyu is causing problems in North Korea, reports the Chosun
- The Ministry of Culture promises that 2007 will bring “new hallyu” (HT to Discontents). We look forward to some of this in London.
- 2007 will also bring us DJG – the musical, while
- 2008 will bring us a Korean joining the performers of the official Beijing Olympics theme tune.