Abstract

Korean traditional music has a popularity problem among Korea's contemporary audiences; given the choice of what to listen to, few South Koreans choose to listen to gugak. To address and overcome this popularity problem, traditional Korean musicians are negotiating and reconstructing traditional Korean music by adopting, appropriating, and altering elements of Korean and international pop music. To this end, Gugak groups recently have been incorporating western musical practices and aesthetics in their performances in digital platforms (YouTube and reality television programs) and in concerts to contemporize the genre and develop a more positive relationship between Koreans and their national music. Groups like E-sang are redefining and re-inventing Korean folk music worldwide as something I call "pop gugak." New pop gugak is in the process of reconstructing the meaning of Korean-ness.

Degree

College and Department

Family, Home, and Social Sciences; Anthropology

Rights

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