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Korean Hallyu

Hallyu (Korean wave 한류) is a widely used name to refer the popularity of Korean entertainment and culture.


An American political Scientist Joseph Nye Interpreted the Korean wave as "the growing popularity all things korean from fashion to film and music to cuisine". 
The 'Hallyu' or 'Korean Wave' word was firstly used in mid 1990 when Korean drama and Korean pop music entered in China, those Korean dramas achieved the milestones by getting millions of views by chinese viewers.
K-pop music which started gaining popularity among Chinese teenagers was introduced by a radio program called 'Seoul Music Room' in 1997. Seoul Music Room was broadcasted from Beijing, China.
There are many stories regarding the rise of the term 'Hallyu' but there is one reliable story and that is about the Korean boy band H.O.T's (Highfive Of Teenagers) live concert in Beijing.

H.O.T

In February 2000, H.O.T performed for 15000 fans at the Beijing Worker's Gymnasium. The Korean news reporters used the term 'Hallyu' in describing this concert as the wave or flow of Korean Culture in china.
The Korean Wave landed in Japan in around 2002 when BoA's (Kwon Bo-ah) album 'Listen to my heart' release in Japan and debuted at no.1 on the Oricon Chart.

BoA

In 2003, a popular K-drama series by KBS 'Winter Sonata' was aired in April-September on NHK television. The drama was a huge hit in Japan that it made the lead male artist Yon Sama (Bae Yoon-Joon) a household name. The craze for Yon Sama was so huge that so many of his fans from Japan visited his filming location in Korea.

Bae Yoon-Joon and Choi Ji-Woo
 lead artist of Winter Sonata

Due to its popular demand in Japan,  'Winter Sonata' was aired again in December 2003.
   

  Kim Gu, a great leader of Korean independence movement, president of provisional government of The Republic Of Korea, mentioned his views about Korean culture and the way he wants this culture to spread in the world, in his autobiography.

Kim Gu

He wrote-
     .....I want our nation to be the most beautiful in the world. By this I do not mean the most powerful nation.......the only thing that I desire in infinite quantity is the power of culture both makes us happy and gives happiness to others....
                   - Kim Gu, Baekbeomilji
                           (Excerpt from 1st March 1948)


  Today, the Hallyu craze covers everything related to Korea. People are interested in Korean culture, clothing, food, literature, language, drama, music and many more things. In this 21st century k-pop is growing more rapidly than any other things. Currently there are more than 150 idol groups in South Korea such as BTS, Blackpink, TXT, EXO, Twice etc.


     And some best examples of rapid rise of  k-pop on global stage are-
  • In 2009, the 5 member girl group 'Wonder Girls' released their song 'Nobody' and became 1st Korean idol group to be listed in Billboard Hot 100.

Wonder Girls
  • In 2012, PSY's song 'Gangnam Style' swept the world with it's beats. the song reached at the 2nd place on Billboard Top 100 in USA, it also became the 1st k-pop song to hit the 1st position on British Official Singles Chart. The video of the song has been watched by over 3.5 billion people on Youtube since it was released.
    PSY

  • In 2018, BTS became the first ever K-pop group to won the Top Social Artist Award at the Billboard Music Awards for 2 years in a row.
BTS
BTS

           There album 'Love Yourself: Tear' topped the Billboard 200 albums chart and the song 'Fake Love' of the same album reached the 10th position on Hot 100 singles chart.

BTS
BTS performed 'Fake Love'
 at Billboard Music Award



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Picture Credit goes to Pinterest.
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