Animals and K-POP - A Case Study on the Symbolism of Wild Animals in Korean Pop Music Performances

Abstract

Animals have been a common interest in relation to human performances of all kinds, an interest that has been present starting with the oldest forms of human rituals and representations. Along with the development and diversification of performance styles and methods, people started making use of animals in order to better express themselves. Similar is the case of entertainment industry performances, where artists often choose to better express the messages they want to send through the help of animal symbols. The current paper means to analyze how animals, with a deeper focus on wild animals, are being used in Korean pop music. Animal symbols should be used with great care, since they sometimes may become confusing. For this reason, when deciding to use animal symbols in promoting entertainment products, people should first take into consideration targeted publics and the cultures they come from, and then construct the products in such a way as to not leave room for misinterpretation.