Highbrow Magazine - Psy https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/psy en The Bamboo Ceiling: Why Hollywood Ignores Asians https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3479-bamboo-ceiling-why-hollywood-ignores-asians <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/film-tv" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Film &amp; TV</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Mon, 01/27/2014 - 09:57</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1hollywoodasians.jpg?itok=p230uRcn"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1hollywoodasians.jpg?itok=p230uRcn" width="480" height="268" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>From our content partner <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2014/01/the-bamboo-ceiling-hollywood-shuns-asians-while-new-media-embraces-them.php">New America Media</a>:</p> <p> </p> <p>In a recent <em>New Yorker cartoon</em>, a dog is shown lounging by a pool and saying to a pup: “Youtube’s one thing, but cats will never make it on the big screen.” A funny commentary, surely, but in America that statement could just as easily be applied to ethnic minorities, especially Asian Americans.</p> <p> </p> <p>Cats and Asian Americans reign supreme on Youtube, but in Hollywood it’s another story: discrimination, stereotypes and exclusion are the norm for Asians, both on television and the silver screen. The most recent evidence of this came during the Golden Globe awards ceremony, where viewers were hard-pressed to find an Asian face in the audience, let alone an Asian name among the nominees. The TV camera showed flashes of the marvelous Lucy Liu and comedian Ansari Aziz, as if trying to make sure that these two “cats” would somehow make up for the lack of Asian diversity. This year’s Oscar nominations offer another example. Not one name, with the exception of Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki, nominated in the Best Animated Feature Film category, is an Asian name.</p> <p> </p> <p>As for racist stereotypes, just take for example the recent episode of “How I Met Your Mother,” a CBS sitcom, in which white actors put on yellow face like Fu Man Chu and spoke in exaggerated Chinese accents. The producers called it a tribute to kung fu, but Asian Americans took to their twitter feeds and called it out for what it is: pure racism.</p> <p> </p> <p>Here are a few of the comments that were posted under the hashtag, #HowIMetYourRacism:</p> <p> </p> <p>‪#HowIMetYourRacism is latest in long line of film &amp; TV that somehow still finds it okay—no, finds it hilarious—to overtly caricature Asians.</p> <p> </p> <p>@CBS With so few Asian Americans on TV and movies, has anything really changed since the 1920's? #HowIMetYourRacism</p> <p> </p> <p>#HowIMetYourRacism. "Yellowface? Orientalism? Fu Manchu? What Not okay @cbs."</p> <p> </p> <p>Wow, ‪@HIMYM_CBS ‪@CBS, your racist mockery of Asian people and culture is…wait for it…LEGENDARY! ‪#HowIMetYourRacism</p> <p> </p> <p>In this day and age it would be unthinkable for white actors to wear black face and make fun of, say, ebonics. The repercussions would be swift, and heads would surely roll. But putting on a yellow face is another matter – racist parodies of Asians somehow remain okay and acceptable in the imaginations of producers and writers.</p> <p> </p> <p>Asians, furthermore, remain foreign enough within U.S. pop culture that such depictions go largely uncastigated -- unless there is a public reaction strong enough to force the offenders, as was the case with the “How I Met Your Mother” debacle, to apologize.</p> <p> </p> <p>That the show’s producers apologized at all is thanks largely to social media, which amplifies otherwise unheard-from populations and creates an equal playing field for ethnic minorities. In this realm, indeed, Asian Americans can dominate.</p> <p> </p> <p>The reigning king of Youtube, for example, is the biggest cat of all – Korean pop sensation, Psy, has garnered nearly 2 billion views of his music video for the worldwide smash, “Gangnam Style,” and his follow-up single, “Gentleman,” has been seen by 625 million viewers. Psy is Korean and not Korean-American, but his rise to success is giving hope to an army of would be Asian American entertainers.</p> <p> </p> <p>Sam Tsui, for instance, who is half-Chinese, is a bonafide Internet star, with an incredible vocal range. His rendition of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” is nearing the 34 million mark on Youtube, and his version of “Just A Dream” with Christina Grimmie, another Youtube sensation, has a whopping 74 million hits. His large following online would make most professional artists turn green with envy.</p> <p> </p> <p>Another Asian Youtube star of note, David Choi, began singing in his bedroom, often with cowlicked hair, but ended up being a guest on various TV shows, writing songs for Warner/Chappell Music, releasing three albums to date, and going on tour around the US and Asia. Then there’s Ryan Higa, who started out making silly skits with his friends in Hawaii only to eventually become a Youtube superstar. His videos average over 30 million hits each. He even produced and starred in two short films that sold out theaters in Hawaii and California.</p> <p> </p> <p>And it’s not just on Youtube and social media that Asian Americans are making inroads. From the get-go, New Media forms have provided an opening for people of color, in terms of their representation in the media. This is especially true of “reality TV” programs -- <em>American Idol</em>, <em>Survivor</em> and <em>Top Chef </em>among them. And Asian Americans don’t just get on reality TV shows -- many of them actually win.</p> <p> </p> <p>Jun Song won on <em>Big Brother</em>, Yul Kwon won <em>Survivor</em>, Kat Chang won <em>The Amazing Race</em>, Poreontics, an all-Asian troupe, won America’s <em>Best Dance Crew</em>, and Aarti Sequeria won <em>The Next Food Network Star</em>, just to name a few.</p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediummindykaling%20%28NAM%29.jpg" style="height:471px; width:600px" /></p> <p>Of particular note are Vietnamese Americans, a group barely visible in American pop culture, who have nevertheless taken many top honors. Chloe Dao sewed her way to the top in <em>Project Runway</em>; Hung Huynh won on <em>Top Chef</em>, using fish sauce as the base ingredient. <em>Last Comic Standing</em> got Dat Phan, a Vietnamese American who made fun of, what else, his mother’s accent. Christine Ha, a blind Vietnamese home cook, whose soup made tough-as-nails Gordon Ramsey tear up, won the <em>Master Chef</em> competition, while Hung Huynh took <em>Top Chef </em>gold in Season 3.</p> <p> </p> <p>Despite the success of Asians on Youtube and Reality TV, Asian American actors find scant roles in Hollywood scripts, and when they do they are often mindless, simplistic stereotypes. In a recent article in Policymic.com titled, “Why Asians are Fleeing Hollywood,” Dana Ter noted: “Whereas Asian-Americans are often times consigned to stereotypical roles in Hollywood, their biculturalism is an asset in Asia. As such, Asia has become the new Land of Opportunity for Asian-Americans trying to make it in the entertainment industry.”</p> <p> </p> <p>One Asian American actor who gave up Hollywood and went to Hong Kong, where her parents were from, once told me that, “Hollywood loves to adopt Asian babies. They just don’t put them in their movies.” Angelina Jolie, Julie Andrews and Mia Farrow are just a few of the famous actors who adopted Asian children. Woody Allen, she said, “found it easier to marry his Korean stepdaughter than to put her in a movie.”</p> <p> </p> <p>The bamboo ceiling exists, and it’s a bitter reality.</p> <p> </p> <p>One is reminded of it constantly, such as when Mirai Nagasu, who took third place at the U.S. National Figure Skating Championships, was overlooked by the U.S. Figure Skating (USFS) committee, which selected Ashley Wagner, who came in fourth place, to compete in the Winter Olympics.</p> <p> </p> <p>“USFS has never in history ignored the results of the Nationals in picking its Olympic athletes when injury was not a factor,” noted Jeff Yang on the Wall <em>Street Journal</em>. “But if Wagner’s ‘all-American’ looks played any role in her selection — and of course, we’ll probably never really know — the real irony is this: blue-eyed, blonde Wagner was born in Heidelberg, Germany. Nagasu, meanwhile, was born in Montebello, Calif.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Or take the case of the <em>Jimmy Kimmel Live</em> show in which Kimmel engaged in a roundtable with children regarding the United States’ $1.3-trillion debt to China. When one of the kids suggested that the U.S. should “kill everyone in China,” Kimmel responded by saying, “That’s an interesting idea.” He later apologized after massive protests by Chinese Americans. (If the child had said, “kill all black people,” the segment most likely would never have been aired, but never mind.)</p> <p> </p> <p>And yet, for all that bitterness, there’s the opportunity for exposure provided by New Media. For those who like to watch cats on Youtube, there’s always a steady stream of new talent. And while they may not be signing big Hollywood deals, they are creating a kind of horizontal, post-modern conversation that is challenging the Hollywood notion of what talent looks and sounds like. These social media and reality personalities are beyond anything imagined by the big money producers, and they are giving old Hollywood a run for its money.</p> <p> </p> <p>Some “dog and cat” videos on Youtube are counterintuitive in that the animals convey a close relationship, getting along splendidly -- cuddling, playing and sleeping together. Those videos offer a reminder that the tension between dogs and cats exists primarily in the mind, and in stereotypes. In that respect, Hollywood could certainly learn a lesson from watching Youtube.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> </p> <p><em>Andrew Lam is editor at New America Media and the author of "Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora," "East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres," and "Birds of Paradise Lost," a collection of short stories about Vietnamese refugees on America's West Coast, which won the Pen/Josephine Miles Literary award.</em></p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2014/01/the-bamboo-ceiling-hollywood-shuns-asians-while-new-media-embraces-them.php">New America Media</a></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/asian-actors" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">asian actors</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/hollywood" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Hollywood</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/golden-globes" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Golden Globes</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/oscars" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Oscars</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/asians-hollywood" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">asians in hollywood</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/aziz-ansari" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Aziz Ansari</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/lucy-liu" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">lucy liu</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/psy" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Psy</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Andrew Lam</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">New America Media</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Mon, 27 Jan 2014 14:57:17 +0000 tara 4190 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3479-bamboo-ceiling-why-hollywood-ignores-asians#comments How Pan-Asian Pop Went Global https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3102-how-pan-asian-pop-went-global <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/music" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Music</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Thu, 10/17/2013 - 10:12</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1kpop_depositphotos.jpg?itok=Lxobtajq"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1kpop_depositphotos.jpg?itok=Lxobtajq" width="480" height="320" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>From our content partner, <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2013/10/a-pan-asian-star-is-born.php">New America Media</a>:</p> <p> </p> <p>Nichkhun Horvejkul is a cultural phenomenon. Born and raised in Southern California, his high school friends told him that with his looks and winning smile, he should be a Korean pop star. Never mind that his parents are immigrants from Thailand, and that he didn't speak a word of Korean.</p> <p> </p> <p>But after being scouted by a Korean pop singer and producer, the 25-year-old landed a contract in Seoul. He had to undergo intense Korean and Mandarin language immersion for two years, along with taking singing and dancing lessons. Now he's is a bona fide Korean pop star, a member of the popular boys band 2 PM.</p> <p> </p> <p>But Nichkhun is so much more: Since he speaks Thai and Chinese and English and Korean, he has so far starred in Chinese and Thai movies, made commercials in Thai and Korean, released several singles in Thai, English and Korean, and is set to star in a Japanese film, an adaptation of the immensely popular manga-anime Ouran High School Host Club. And yes, he's learning Japanese to play his character of Lawrence, the president of a Singaporean corporation.</p> <p> </p> <p>Nichkhun is a Pan Asian star, exemplar of an increasingly borderless cultural sphere first envisioned – and nearly realized – more than a century ago by Imperial Japan.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Pan-Asia Goes Pop</strong></p> <p> </p> <p>The idea of a Pan-Asian region – or in Japanese colonial parlance the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere – first emerged in the 19th-century following Japan’s surprise defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese war. Japan then imagined Asia as one, culturally, economically and militarily, with Tokyo at the helm.</p> <p> </p> <p>That idea went up in smoke, along with Japan’s larger imperial goals at the end of WWII.</p> <p> </p> <p>Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore again resuscitated the idea of a unified Asia in the early 90s, an era defined by the rise of the so-called Asian Tiger economies. Lee coined the phrase "Asian Values," implying a common – if tenuous – cultural thread across the region. It was later picked up by then Malaysian PM Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, forming the basis of his "Look East Policy."</p> <p> </p> <p>As with Japan, these ideas, too, stumbled over deep-seated nationalist sentiments and historical animosities. They were top down, chauvinistic reactions – largely geopolitical in flavor -- to an Asian colonial past, and a need to assert newfound economic prowess against Western influences.</p> <p> </p> <p>What is happening in Asia today is much more organic, hardly anti-West, and playing on screens across the region.</p> <p> </p> <p>"Today," noted Christina Klein, writing for <em>Yale Global</em> some years ago, "the notion of a distinctly American or Chinese or Indian cinema is breaking down.” Film industries, she writes, are becoming “increasingly integrated with one another in ways that make them simultaneously more global and more local."</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/2kpop.jpg" style="height:449px; width:673px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>A Modern Cosmo</strong></p> <p> </p> <p>Asian pop culture today crosses borders as easily as the bird flu. Korean rapper Psy, whose 2012 single “Gangnam Style” has garnered a record of close to 2 billion hits on YouTube, is probably the best example. But he’s not alone.</p> <p> </p> <p>Takeshi Kaneshiro, a Taiwanese actor with Japanese ancestry who <em>Time Magazine</em> called the "Asian film industry's Johnny Depp," has starred in Japanese and Chinese language movies for over two decades. The 2006 Thai film <em>Invisible Waves</em> was set in Macau, Thailand, and Hong Kong, with a cast and crew from Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand and Korea.</p> <p> </p> <p>Then there's Leehom Wang, born in upstate New York and now a rising Pan-Asian star. His love for aboriginal Chinese, Tibetan, and Mongolian music and his alchemical adaptation of them all to, as he said, "make them cool," has made him one of the most influential artists on the modern Chinese music scene. Wang now enjoys the largest following in Mainland China, including on the microblog site Weibo. He has also starred in several movies, including Ang Lee's <em>Lust, Caution.</em></p> <p> </p> <p>Indeed, the growing list of such cross-cultural and cross-border collaborations is a far cry from the days when East Asia remained separated by the Cold War's bamboo curtains.</p> <p> </p> <p>But in the Pan-Asian entertainment sphere, the major collaboration remains between China and Korea. Recently, movie magazine <em>Screen Daily</em> reported that Korea and China have "co-financed several films together, most recently CJ Entertainment and China Film's <em>A Wedding Invitation</em>, and 3D sports action drama <em>Mr Go</em>.”</p> <p> </p> <p>The combined Korean and Chinese box-office markets are now worth almost $4 billion annually, according to the magazine, and that number is only going to rise. Pan-Asian films and Pan-Asian stars, after all, guarantee an international box office and can, therefore, draw in big international investors.</p> <p> </p> <p>"Our separate lands are one from now on/We are Asians/ We sing in one voice, and we sing in one song," crooned Singaporean pop star Dick Lee nearly two decades ago.</p> <p> </p> <p>Wang Leehom followed that message with another at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. "I used to dream that I could soar beyond the clouds/Just close my eyes and fly away.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Wang’s dream of transcending boundaries – of language, of nation – is the unifying theme behind this latest iteration of Pan-Asian identity, a modern cosmopolitanism rooted in regional fluidity. “Blue skies inspire us to be free as a bird/And that dream connects us every day."</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p><em>Andrew Lam is an editor with New America Media and the author of three books, "Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora," "East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres," and his latest, "Birds of Paradise Lost," a collection of short stories about Vietnamese refugees struggling to rebuild their lives in the Bay Area. It's now available on Kindle.</em></p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2013/10/a-pan-asian-star-is-born.php">New America Media</a></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Photos: <a href="https://depositphotos.com/stock-photography.html">Depositphotos.co</a>m</strong></p> <p> </p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/asia" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Asia</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/asians" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">asians</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/pan-asian" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">pan asian</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/psy" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Psy</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nichkhun" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">nichkhun</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/asian-singers" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">asian singers</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/k-pop-0" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">k pop</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/music" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Music</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/pop-music" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">pop music</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Andrew Lam</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 17 Oct 2013 14:12:32 +0000 tara 3690 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3102-how-pan-asian-pop-went-global#comments ‘Gangnam Style’ Video Sweeps the Internet and the Western World https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1670-gangnam-style-video-sweeps-internet-and-western-world <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Thu, 10/11/2012 - 17:24</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumgangamstyle%20%28NAM%29.jpg?itok=xmI5VE_0"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumgangamstyle%20%28NAM%29.jpg?itok=xmI5VE_0" width="480" height="267" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> From <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/10/gangnam-style-video-upends-crossover-success-myths.php">New America Media</a>:</p> <p>  </p> <p> Anthropologists and linguists no doubt are having a field day trying to chronicle and dissect how, in the early autumn of 2012, “Gangnam Style” became an American idiomatic expression. It stands for something along the lines of a brash, flamboyant way of doing things, clownishness, or an act of in-your-face spoofing that is both original and entertaining.</p> <p>  </p> <p> A recently set-up Wikipedia page showcases “Gangnam Style” as the most watched Youtube video of the year. It has garnered 425 million hits and counting since July, and has spun off countless other videos. Among them: North Korea’s own version to spoof a South Korean presidential candidate, and the “Mitt Romney Style” spoof video.</p> <p>  </p> <p> And the genius behind the dance that mimics riding an invisible horse? Jae-Sang Park, erstwhile Psy (short for psycho), a rapper whose career galloped into global superstardom with the distinction of topping the iTunes charts in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and 28 other countries. Psy’s video is also the most “liked” on Youtube, as well as the most-watched video in Korean entertainment history.</p> <p>  </p> <p> But something beyond Korean history has clearly occurred with the global sanctification of Psy. It’s the history of crossover itself, the phenomenon that has traditionally been treacherous and cruel, with so many talented entertainers from the Far East or elsewhere at the margins of the Commonwealth, falling off the tightrope on the way to global stardom.</p> <p>  </p> <p> To crossover, as far as the world of arts and entertainment is concerned, is to go from the margin to the center, from one set of culture to another, trying to succeed in the latter. But, as a rule, it demands the betrayal of the original, and it requires reinvention -- something nearly impossible for those who are entrenched in their own language and cultural sensibilities.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Take the case of Hong Kong actors Chow Yun Fat and Jackie Chan, and the South Korean singer Bi Rain. Bi Rain, with his extraordinary dancing skills and his teenage heartthrob status, is known all over Asia as its own Michael Jackson. But Rain met with drought in North America, where he starred in two movies that flopped, and his bid for global stardom quickly failed. Chow Yun Fat, voted by the <em>LA Times</em> as “the coolest actor” in the world in the mid-90s, too, failed in Hollywood, in part because that very Hong Kong coolness turned lukewarm in Hollywood movies, and the hard-boiled image that made him famous in the East came off as stilted in the West. Bombed at the box office with his action movies, Chow ended up playing a stereotypical hideous character in <em>Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End</em>. His role was deemed so offensive that it was cut in the version shown in China.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Jackie Chan, the most successful of them all, is worthy of note for his repeated attempts over three decades as an action star in Hollywood. When he finally made it big he was, alas, already steeped in middle age.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Then came Psy, whose crossover moment seems to suggest a major shift in the history of the entertainment world itself. For one thing, it turns the old rules upside down: that crossing over requires giving up the original way of doing things, that the odds are stacked against those who try, and that it takes years of toiling and perseverance, even for the super sexy, cool and talented. Or, at the very least, you have to leave your home country to do so.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Well, not anymore, not if you do it Gangnam Style. The first thing for cultural critics to take note is the speed with which a cultural event can transmit these global days: Psy bursts like a supernova from regional to world stage in a few weeks time, and he didn’t even need to leave Seoul. The second thing to take note of is equally important, if not more so: His video, performed in Korean, is downloaded largely by people who don’t understand one word of the language.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumjackiechan%20%28jackiechandotcom%29.jpg" style="width: 398px; height: 600px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Psy, mindful of this, told NPR recently: “If I have a chance I want my music lyric[s] to be Korean… The world's most famous and popular language is music. So if we have some sort of solution with these kinds of dance moves and this kind of music video so that I can use Korean if possible? It's really huge history for my country.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> In other words, since he didn’t try to crossover, but the phenomenon nevertheless crossed him, why not continue to do what he does best? It is the kind of thinking that may very well revolutionize the margin in its relationship to the center.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Let’s look at it another way: All major recording stars from England and North America do not worry about crossovers to the rest of the known world. There’s an undeniable centrality to the West. From The Beetles to Beyoncé to Lady Gaga, Western stars are idolized the world over, their songs memorized, even if their adoring fans don’t understand English. Broadcasting from the center, one has no need for translation. Whatever is good for the West is deemed good enough for the rest of the world.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Such is the shape of the powers and unwritten rule taught subliminally long ago -- going from West to East, as well as elsewhere, since the European conquest of the known world 500 years ago has always been a passage of relative ease. It does not demand transformation or self-reinvention from a Westerner. It is catered to.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The reverse, however, has always been a difficult path, an enormous undertaking. An American moving to Vietnam to work and live, for instance, need not speak Vietnamese to thrive; his language is coveted; his status assumed superior. On the other hand, a Vietnamese who hopes to make it big in the United States needs to master the English language at the very least.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The significance of Gangnam Style video is extraordinary in that it refutes that assumption: It assumes a centrality all on its own. It sets its own terms, has its own rhythm, and it dwells in its own particularities.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Yet, its rise to universality is no fluke. Its success occurs when the world is shifting in radical ways, at a time when individuals, empowered by the information technology, can change world history. Witness the video that vilified the Prophet Mohammed by a Christian Coptic Egyptian living in California a month ago that caused massive protests against the United States and undermined U.S. foreign soft policy in the Middle East; or the Tunisian fruit seller whose self immolation a year earlier was captured on cell phones and broadcasted online. It ignited the Arab Spring, leading to regime changes in several countries.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The Oppa Gangnam Style video also arrived at a moment when the East is integrating with the West at full speed, reiterating the idea that globalization is no longer a one-way love affair. It arrived at a time when yoga replaced aerobics, acupuncture and herbal treatment are alternative choices for treating chronic diseases, and the world’s children are enthralled by Japanese anime and manga, and kung-fu becomes norm for action films.</p> <p>  </p> <p> That a South Korean video gained global stardom is also no fluke. South Korea, after all, actively supports its artists and totes its pop culture abroad as part of its foreign policy. It takes as much pride in its economic rise as it does in its cultural ascendancy. It even built a Hallyu – Korean Wave - museum at the Incheon Airport to celebrate its global stars and their achievements. It is a country that insists on its own centrality and its own growing contribution to the cultural matrix that defines modern Asia.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Indeed, in Asia there is an old dream of resistance. It was first a dream of 19th century Japan after the defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese war. It imagined the continent as one, a continuous land, its people interconnected. That idea was resuscitated by Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore a century later, during the rise of Asian economic powers in the post Cold War era. While Lee spurred the phrase "Asian Values," nearby Malaysia's leader, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, came up with a similar "Look East Policy."</p> <p>  </p> <p> But those ideas had been more or less top down, militaristic, and largely ideological -- a regional chauvinistic reaction to its colonial past, and a need to assert its newfound prowess against Western influences. What is happening now, a couple of generations later, however, is much more organic, and solidly on the cultural ground and, hardly anti-West.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Gangnam Style, after all, is a rap song. And its rise occurs at a time when ours has become a world in which traditions exist side by side for the borrowing and taking, and ultimately, the mixing. And it would seem that in a world where cultural integration and hybridization are the norm, all forms of art could become both at once intensely global and local.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Indeed, from religion to cuisine, from medicine to music, from dance to literature, from agricultural practices to filmmaking, all are available to the contemporary alchemists to reshape and re-imagine. The playing field is slowly being leveled.</p> <p>  </p> <p> So if America could make a movie called Kung Fu Panda and turn it into a number-one hit in China, then it follows that a Korean artist, too, can rise to the top of the music chart in America, riding an invisible horse and rapping in his own language -- Gangnam Style, of course.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio: </strong></p> <p> <em>Andrew Lam is author of</em> Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora, which won a Pen American Award in 2006, and East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres, <em>which was listed as one of top 10 Indies by</em> Shelf Unbound Magazine. <em>His next book,</em>"Birds of Paradise Lost<em>" will be published next year. He has lectured widely at many universities.</em></p> <p>  </p> <p> <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/10/gangnam-style-video-upends-crossover-success-myths.php">New America</a> <a href="http://newamericamedia.org/2012/10/gangnam-style-video-upends-crossover-success-myths.php">Media</a></p> <p>  </p> <p> <em><strong>Photos: New America Media; official website of Jackie Chan.</strong></em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/psy" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Psy</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/gangnam-style" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Gangnam style</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/youtube" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Youtube</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/jackie-chan" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">jackie chan</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/chow-yun-fat" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">chow yun fat</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/south-korea" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">South Korea</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/north-korea" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">North Korea</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/hollywood-movies" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Hollywood movies</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Andrew Lam</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">New America Media</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 11 Oct 2012 21:24:33 +0000 tara 1724 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1670-gangnam-style-video-sweeps-internet-and-western-world#comments