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Government of the Russian Federation

National Research University Higher School of Economics

Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs

Educational Programme

“Socio-Economic and Political Development of Modern Asia”

MASTER'S THESIS

"Korean wave" as a cultural phenomenon in the context of china's popular culture

Anastasiya Egorova

Moscow, 2019

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Chapter I. The Concept of Chinese Popular Culture
• 1. Theoretical Framework. Diversified Ideas of Popular Culture
• 2. East Asian Cultural Economy
• 3. The Structure and History of Chinese Popular Culture
• 3.1 Cinema and TV production
• 3.2 Pop Music Industry
• 4. Multilingual Character of the Chinese Pop Culture
• 5. Chinese Pop Culture and the De-centering of Chinese Identity
• 6. Why is China Not the Center?
• Conclusion of Chapter I
• Chapter II. The Phenomenon of the Korean Wave in China
• 1. The Term “Hallyu” in a Global Context
• 2. The Rise of Hallyu: Television Dramas
• 2.1 The Rise of Hallyu: China Focus
• 2.2 Reasons for the Popularity of Korean Dramas in China42
• 3. From TV to Popular Music
• 3.1 Hallyu 2.0. K-pop as a Primary Agent of the “Neo-Korean Wave”
• 4. The Hybrid Nature of Korean Popular Culture
• Conclusion of Chapter II
• Chapter III. Governmental Policies and Limitations for Hallyu in China
• 1. Korean Governmental Policies in Promoting Hallyu
• 2. China's Governmental Policies and Limitations for Hallyu
• 2.1 Anti-Hallyu Movement in China
• Conclusion of Chapter III
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Appendix 1
• Appendix 2


Introduction

In a recent couple of years, the so-called Korean Wave (or Hallyu) has become a major global phenomenon symbolizing rapid spread of South Korean popular culture (TV shows, films, and music) across the world. Korean pop music and TV dramas became known well beyond Asia in the countries of Europe, America, and the Middle East.Fans around the world go crazy for their favorite Korean actors and singers (or idols, as they are called), the concerts of Korean pop groups are packed with hundreds of thousands of people, and Korean TV dramas and shows attract millions of viewers from different countries. Moreover, the enjoyment of TV and music has led to the demand for Korean cosmetics and Korean food, more and more people started to visit South Korea and learn Korean language.Hallyu have become a major image-maker of South Korea attracting crowds of consumers in different parts of the world. As of December 2017, 73.12 million people from 92 countries joined Hallyu-related fan clubs and organizations all across Asia, North and South America, Europe, Oceania, Africa, and the Middle East Hallyu (Korean Wave)// Korea.Net: the Official Website of the Republic of Korea.Retrieved April 22, 2019 from http://www.korea.net/AboutKorea/Culture-and-the-Arts/Hallyu. For over two decades, KoreaHere and further in my work by “Korea” I mean South Korea. For my convenience, in this thesis both terms have equal meaning. has managed to build a strong soft power that fascinates the world. When and how did it all start? Does it have a limit, and what are the perspectives of Korean Wave in the near future? These are the questions thatconcern not only the Hallyu fans but scholars as well.

To my mind, nowadays, when this phenomenon has grown to such a scale, it is especially important and interesting to figure out the reasons for its popularity around the world,its history and origin, which in fact goes back to China's acceptance of Korean cultural products at the end of the 1990s. It is the Chinese market that became the first export market for the Korean TV dramas and popular music, and it is the Chinese pop culture's structure that helped Korean Wave spread so quickly and easily first around the ethnic Chinese communities of East Asia, and then well beyond. I consider this to be the first reason that determinesthe relevance of my thesis's topic.The second reason is the following. Nowadays, China is still the biggest market for Korean cultural products. However, various socio-cultural and political factors have significantly limited the Korean Wave in China and launched the anti-Hallyu sentiment among certain groups of the Chinese population. For instance, the most significant stage of Hallyu in China in recent years is the governmental ban on South Korean cultural products due to political issues between the two countries. It would not bean exaggeration to say that since 2016, the Korean Wave in China has been significantly limited on a governmental level. Not many works are written on Hallyu in China analyzing the situation following the ban of 2016. My thesis is intended to fill that gap by summarizing the existing studies on Korean Wave in China and adding the new factors and tendencies that determine the perspectives of Hallyu development in China nowadays.Moreover, I carried out an online survey among Chinese university students on their attitude towards various aspects of Korean Wave present in their lives. The results helped me strengthen some tendencies and conclusions that I made about the Korean Wave in China. With the use of online resources on Korean Wave, I also carried out the research on the presence of Chinese singers in the K-pop industry by taking popular Korean pop groups and listing the ethnic Chinese members in them. Thisknowledge also helped me to find out the Chinese students' attitude towards Chinese members of Korean groups and whether their presence makes K-pop more appealing to the Chinese audience.

Thus, the purpose of this paper is to examine Korean Wave as a cultural phenomenon within the context of China's modern popular culture.

As primary sources, I use relevant Hallyu related statistics corresponding to my topic and reports from Korea Foundation for International Culture Exchange (KOFICE), the official website of the Republic of Korea, along with the statistics and charts on Korean and Chinese pop music achievements from Billboard and Chinese online streaming services. I also use press releases and official statements by South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism along with reports of official statement and facts from Yonhap News Agency.

For my own research, I use the data collected through the online poll service and different websites dedicated to Korean popular culture and celebrities like korea.net, kprofiles.com, kpop.fandom.com. Moreover, I use the data from Weibo pages of several Chinese celebrities and social media groups dedicated to Hallyu in China. chinese culture music korea

As a cultural phenomenon, the Korean Wave can have a significant impact on how the Chinese people perceive Korea and Korean culture. In this sense, it can become a channel through which Chinese people receive information about Korea and Korean society and formulate their own attitude towards it. However, Hallyu can-not be regarded simply within the cultural context, it is rather a multi-layered and multidimensional phenomenon with cultural, social, economic, and sometimes even political implications.Such multifaceted nature of this phenomenon has led to various theoretical approaches and narrow issues on the Korean Wave.

In terms of the pure cultural aspect, the cultural proximity factor has been one of the most notable one (Chua 2004, Kim 2011, Soo 2012) along with the studies relating the Western form and Confucian contents of Korean pop culture (Shim 2006, Kim 2011, Chua 2012). There have been numerous opinions on Hallyu as a new form of the modern globalization process (Chua 2004,Kim 2009,Kim 2013, Kuwahara 2014; Chua, Iwabuchi 2008; Shim 2005, 2006; Nam 2013, Dal 2018). Cultural globalization framework has also led to some scholars focusing on Hallyu as a product of Korea's cultural imperialism (Duong 2016, Yang 2012, Nam 2013). Many works on Hallyu are written within a more global context of East Asian region and its well-integrated cultural economy (Shim, Heyanto 2010, Nam 2013, Chua 2004, 2012; Chua, Iwabuchi 2008) while others focus on the Korean Wave in China (Kim 2011, Lee 2000, Soo 2012, Ahn 2014). Among them, there is a special focus on the reasons of the popularity of Korean culture in China (Kim 2011, Wei 2016, Han 2012), as well as the Anti-Hallyusentiment (Kang 2008, Leung 2008 in Chua and Iwabuchi 2008, Kim 2011). In the era of Internet communications, numerous works have been dedicated to Hallyu development in the social media both globally and in China, in particular (Kiuchi 2016; Cha, Kim 2014, Ahn 2014; Lee, Nornes 2015; Jin 2016). Some studies that I use in my thesis focus specifically on measuring the characteristics and size of the audience of Korean Wave and their perception of Korean cultural products (Kim, Conolly 2016; Yang 2012, Kim 2009). There are works that cover the economic aspect of Hallyu (Woodier, Park 2017) or introducing Hallyu as South Korean “cultural export” (Truong 2014). Some focus on political implication of the Korean Wave within the context of Korea-China relationship (Soo 2012, Kim 2011) introducing the term “cultural diplomacy” (Elfving 2013).

As for the theoretical background of the term “popular culture”, in my work I prefer to take popular culture as commercialized cultural industry as described by Horkhemer and Adorno (2002) but follow the contemporary tendency of abandoning critical and pessimistic view on it. I look at popular culture as a specific product of a modern industrialized urban society.

As for the literature about the Chinese popular culture, significant input has been made by Singaporean sociologist Chua Beng Huat (2008, 2012). In these works, he analyzes various aspects of East Asian pop culture and China, in particular, describes the peculiarities its cultural industry and the development of the Pan-Chinese popular culture structure as a whole (which includes ethnic Chinese communities outside Mainland China).

The volume edited by Chua and Iwabuchi (2008), for its part, brings together the studies of reception of Japanese and later Korean TV shows and dramas, providing us with some important data for East Asian Pop Culture regional comparisons.

Besides the works with the broad reviews of Chinese pop culture, there are those with specific focuses on TV and Film industries like the work of Curtin (2007) who conducted an exhaustive survey of theTV and movie industry withinthe Chinese pop culture; Fu (2008) who described the development of Shaw Brothers company which was crucial for the Chinese and Hong Kong film industry. There are works with the focus on China's regional culture industries (Taylor 2008, Tu 1991), or on the global aspect (Kwok 2007, Han 2012), on TV industry (Tay 2009) and music (De Kloet 2000).

The research question of my thesis is “What are the factors that make Korean Wave a cultural phenomenon in the context of China's popular culture?” Therefore, the object of analysis is China's popular culture, its manifestation, and tendencies of development.

Among the objectives of my research are:

· To define the concept of Chinese popular culture;

· To figure out the reasons for the popularity of the Korean Wave in China;

· To formulate the Chinese public opinion on Korean Wave as compared to their sentiment towards domestic popular culture;

· To define the limitations of the Korean Wave in China;

· To define the criteria for evaluating Hallyu's influence on Chinese popular culture.

Chapter I of my work is dedicated to the concept ofChinese popular culture. I start my thesis with outlininggeneral idea of popular culture, its history and theoretical frameworks. Furthermore, I focus on the particular aspect of today's Chinese popular culture and place it within the context of East Asian cultural economy. It is necessary to say that firstly I describe the Chinese popular culture in broader terms including the Chinese speaking communities ofcontinental China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia (Singapore, Malaysia, etc.). Such broad overview of ethnic Chinese communities in different regions is crucial for understanding the concept and complicated de-centered structure of the Chinese popular culture which modern-day China is a part of.

Chapter II of this work is dedicated to the phenomenon of the Korean Wave in China. Here I specify the origins of the term “Korean Wave” and the phenomenon itself first within the global East Asian context and then focuson China, particularly on the two “moving forces” of the Korean Wave in this country which are TV dramas and K-pop (Korean popular music).Thus, the subject Matterof my thesis is the phenomenon of Korean Wave (Hallyu) in Chinese popular culture.

In Chapter III of the thesis, I analyze the measures to promote Hallyu by the Korean authorities and China's state policies towards the Korean Wave, as well as limitations for this phenomenon in China including anti-Hallyu sentiment and other important factors. Various findings in chapters II and III of this work are also proved by the results of the online poll that I conducted among the Chinese students.

The main methods I applied in my thesis are a meta-analysis of existing studies on Hallyu, a statistical analysiswhich involves statistics and the information collected through the electronic resources. Moreover, I used the survey method by means of an online poll to find out the attitude of the Chinese audience towards Hallyu in China.

The chronological framework of the thesis encompasses the time period from the beginning of the 1990s when the Korean Wave only started to take over in China and East Asia, until the present days when it has grown to such a scale that it became known as a global phenomenon across the world.

Chapter I. The Concept of Chinese Popular Culture

1. Theoretical Framework. Diversified Ideas of Popular Culture

Although scholars have shown much interest in the studies of popular culture for quite a long time, they still can not come to the final conclusion considering the definition of this concept. They disagree with each other and have different opinions on popular culture, which evidently points out the complexity of the notion.

For the last century, popular culture has been given different names such as “populace culture”, “industrial culture”, “mass culture”, “consumption culture”, “media culture”, and so onDeng Pengzhuo. The Evolution of Concept of Popular Culture and Its Significance // Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Vol. 7, May 2017. - No. 5. P. 389..As popular culture itself can be measured in too many dimensions, scholars have had a hard time figuring out its characteristics. In different, or even in the same periods of time, they had different ideas about these characteristics and disagreed with each other.

Generally speaking, scientific discourse on popular culture can be divided into critical analysis and positive approach. The Critical analysisemphasizes the characteristics of a “low”, primitive culture, a “culture of the masses”, posing a threat to “elite culture”, or emphasized the use of mass culture by the elites that arouse “low instincts” for the spiritual exploitation of the masses, mass standardization and de-identification. Positive approach, for its part, views mass culture as a generally quite satisfactory form of culture, characteristic of a mature industrial society with a high level of education, a high standard of living, and a well-developed system of mass communications.

In other words, those who take critical position consider popular culture as low, rude, vulgar and kind of passive, while the positive approach representatives view it as active, equal and practical.

The emergence of popular culture in cultural studies is often traced back to the Industrial Revolution.According to John Storey,popular culture certainly could only emerge following the processes of industrialization and urbanization. To his mind, this assumptionmakes Britain the first country that ever produced popular culture Storey John. Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: An Introduction, 4th ed. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2006.. Therefore, it is important to look at the British pioneer in this field Matthew Arnold. In his critique of Victorian society, he pointed out that most of the average people were poor and did not have access to education, therefore could not read and write properly. Thus, he argued that the “populace” was illiterate, rude, low, and lack cultural cultivation, so was the populace culture Arnold Matthew. Culture and Anarchy. Retrieved March 27, 2019 from http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4212. He also mentioned the existing conflicts between populace and elite culture across Britain.

Such ideas were inherited by F.R.LeavisRaymond Leavis Frank. Arnold's Thought. A Review of “Matthew Arnold”, by Lionel Trilling. Scrutiny, June 1939. P. 92-99. who divided traditional British culture into the “elite culture” and “mass civilization” formed by the Industrial Revolution which obviously referred to popular culture. So to him, popular culture was commercialized, lower and rudeconsumed by the illiterate masses without any critique.He considered this consumption poisonous and paralyzing for the masses in Britain. Besides Leavis, such scholars as Stuart Hall, Richard Hoggart, Raymond Williams,Edward Thompson, etc. also took the critical position towards popular culture. They contributed their ideas to the cultural studies and were later calledthe British School.

Another school that held a critical position towards popular culture wasthe Frankfurt School which studied the influence of mass culture and media on society and ideology. The school was considered to be critical to capitalism and denied modern industrial society. Their studies were aimed at revealing the dark sides of capitalism.

In their work, the concept of “cultural industry” became fundamental and referred to as “both the process of cultural industrialization of mass production and the commercial system promoted by the process”Deng Pengzhuo. Op. cit. P. 390.. For the Frankfurt School, the so-called popular culture is not the culture of average people, but the culture whose moving tool is popular media like radio, films, gramophone which become the channels of popularizing this culture. Therefore, for the Frankfurt the study of popular culture mostly focused on media-devices their contents and forms.

Here the concept of cultural industry becomes fundamental, which guarantees the stability of capitalism. This means that mass culture forms conformism, keeps consumer reactions in an infantile, static state, and allows him to manipulate his mind. Thus, the assessment of phenomenal popular culture within the framework of these studies is also negative. Among the most significant representatives of the Frankfurt School are Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Benjamin Walter, and Herbert Marcuse.

The ideas of Frankfurt School were criticizedin the contemporary culture studies asmonolithic and pessimistic. Moreover, not all of their works contain the same consistent and rigid view of popular culture. For example, in contrast to Horkheimer and Adorno who argued that cultural industry (or popular culture) is not developedspontaneously by masses of“the lower class”, but represents and reproduces the dominant ideology imposed by the upper classHorkheimer, Max. Traditional and Critical Theory. In: Connerton P. (Eds), Critical Sociology: Selected Readings, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1976.

Adorno, T. W., Horkheimer Max. Dialectic of Enlightenment. Trans. Edmund Jephcott. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002.; Walter Benjamin is more distinctive and optimistic towards popular culture. He believes in the subject of popular culture, which is people and does not think all of them are numb and insensible. In his point of view, popular culture is not rude and low. Moreover, Benjamin argues that popular culture and elite culture do not necessarily contradict each other.

Nowadays,with the development of mass communication system the term “popular culture” has lost its critical orientation. Cultural industry has already abandoned the Marxist dialectic conception of society, and in contemporary studies it is more common to escape from a monolithic concept of popular culture. Instead, scholars try to describe culture as a whole as a complicated formation of discourses that respond to particular interests and widespread public needs, and always dialectically related to their producers and consumersFor example, the work following this tendency is Andrew Ross. No Respect. Intellectuals and Popular Culture, New York/London: Routledge, 1989..

As Holt N. Parker states in his article, an exact definition of the concept of popular culture is “elusive”Parker Holt N. Toward a Definition Of Popular Culture // History and Theory, Vol. 50, May 2011. - ¹2, P. 169.. There have been offered various definitions focusing on different aspects and dimensions of popular culture but none of them can satisfy the need to define this notion completelyIbidem..

Following this statement, I dare to choose the conventional definition of popular culture which fits my research the most and refers to “mass entertainment-television,film, and pop music” as “popular culture”Chua Beng Huat. Structure, Audience and Soft Power in East Asian Pop Culture. Hong Kong University Press, 2012. P. 9.. Therefore, I am inclined to take popular culture as commercialized cultural industry as described by Horkheimer and Adorno, but follow the contemporary tendency of abandoning critical and pessimistic view on it. Thus, the central characteristics of popular culture to me in this thesis are commercialization and focus on mass entertainment.

In my work, I will look at popular culture as a concept that is used to characterize modern cultural production and consumption. It is the production of culture, organized by the type of mass, serial conveyor industry and supplying the same standardized, serial, mass product for standardized mass consumption. Popular culture is a specific product of a modern industrialized urban society.

I would also like to mention that, in spite of Stuart Hall's propositionHall Stuart. Notes on Deconstructing `The Popular'.” In Storey John (ed.), Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader. New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1994. P. 455-466., that “pop culture” (“as commercially-produced, profit-driven, media-based mass entertainment”) is only one smaller segment of the notion of “popular culture” (which is “the larger cultural sphere that encompasses the everyday life of the masses in contradiction to and contestation with elite culture”)Quoted in Chua Beng Huat. P. 9., in my text I use both terms as equal in their meaning.

2. East Asian Cultural Economy

Before defining the notion of Chinese pop culture, it is crucial to look at the concept of East Asian popular culture as a larger entity, which comprises Chinese pop culture in particular.Starting from the early 1990s,pop culture from different centers has been flowing and crossing national and cultural boundaries, regularly spreading all over the region of East Asia. Thus, a form of East Asian transnational pop culture, which can be seen more like a loosely integrated regional cultural economyhas been createdIbid. P. 5..

Here I need to clarify the definition of the term “cultural economy”.Cultural economy is the branch of economics that focuses on the relations between culture and economic outcomes. “Here, `culture' is defined by shared beliefs and preferences of respective groups. Programmatic issues include whether and how much culture matters as to economic outcomes and what its relation is to institutions”Fernández Raquel. Culture and Economics. The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd Edition, 2008.. In this regard, pop culture is essentially a mass entertainment consumer product.In other words, in the cultural economy, it is not commodities as material objects that are consumed, but it is rather meanings and symbolic values, which are inexhaustible and continue to circulate in the ever-expanding channels of communication. In this sense, the whole process of cultural consumption is alwayssimultaneously a process of communication and cultural exchange. Cultural economy, as an economy can be divided into 4 processes: production, distribution, circulation, and consumptionChua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 12..

For its part, Chinese pop culture is a very important part of the East Asiantransnational pop culture. It has its own peculiarities which determine its existence and define it as different from other East Asian pop cultures, not only culturally but, what is more interesting,structurally.As Chua Beng Huat points out, the processes of production, distribution, circulation, and consumption as well as the overall structure of Chinese language pop culture is relatively stable and “can be substantively and discursively constituted as Pop Culture China”Ibid. P. 4.. Chinese pop culture is spread way across the borders of continental China. It is a “de-centered, multilingual, multi-nodal, relatively well-integrated cultural economy that operates under the presumed `sameness' of a `common' Chinese cultural heritage”Tay Jinna. Television in Chinese Geo-Linguistic Markets: Deregulation, Regulation and Market Forces in the Post-broadcast Era.” In Turner Graeme, Tay Jinna (eds.), Television Studies after TV: Understanding Television in the Post-Broadcast Era, London: Routledge, 2009. P. 105-114..

3. The Structure and History of Chinese Popular Culture

Starting from the beginning of the 20^th century, the ethnic Chinese population has had a long history of pop culture exchange. In this sense, East Asian popular culture is built upon the historically well-established regional network of Chinese language cultural industries. As I already mentioned, China plays a significant role in the East Asian Popular culture and is an integral part of it. This makes it impossible to analyze East Asian popular culture without looking deeper into the history and organization of ethnic Chinese pop culture structure. Similarly, it is also hard to look at Chinese pop culture out of the context of East Asian regional cultural exchange. As we will see in later parts of this work, the role that Chinese pop culture structure plays in the crisscrossing ofdifferent East Asian popcultures is one of the significant factors of the spreading and acceptance of Korean Wave in Asia.

By the end of the 1990s - the beginning of 2000s, due to this “historically well-established” commercial network,Chinese language pop culturehad been already created, spread and consumed for almost a century. Through this structure from the1920s there was a continuous spreading of Chinese pop music and films, and after 1960s - TV shows, as well.

3.1 Cinema and TV production

The structural center and the best illustration of the Chinese pop culture industry is a multinational media enterprise Shaw Brothers Curtin Michael. Playing to the World's Largest Audience: The Globalization of Chinese Film and TV. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007..It was initially established by four brothers as a cinema production company in Shanghai atthe beginning of the 1920s. By mid-20s,it moved its financial headquarters to Singapore and founded cinema houses all over the Malay peninsula.At the beginning of the 1930s, the company was moved to Hong Kong where it mostly producedCantonese language films and then showed them in the movie theatres of Southeast Asia.Thus, from the 1930s, Hong Kong has taken a central place in the production and distribution of Chinese language cinema.

After the Second World War, the Hong Kong Studio was renovated and provided with best modern equipment which allowed it to use color and widescreen formats for Chinese languagecinema. The studio in Hong Kong became by far the biggest and best technically equipped studio in the history of Chinese movie productionFu Poshek. China Forever: The Shaw Brothers and Diasporic Cinema. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2008.. After the modernization and reorganization, it once again rose to domination in the industry in the 1950s, switching from Cantonese to Mandarin movies along the way. By 1960s, Mandarin became the main language of cinema production.

Among the important factors that paved the way for Hong Kong to become a center of Cantonese and Mandarin cinema production, is the fact that it almost had no competition in the Ethnic Chinese population regions. There was only a brief development of small scale production of Hokkien films financed by the overseas Chinese capital from the PhilippinesTaylor Jeremy E. From Transnationalism to Nativism? The Rise, Decline and Reinvention of Regional Hokkien Entertainment Industry // Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, 2008. - ¹9 (1). P. 62-81.. These films were spread all over Southeast Asia, which became the main market after China closed its borders.

During the Cold War, there was a consolidation of communism in the Mainland, and the newly established the communist People's Republic of China was largely excluded from the Chinese language pop culture sphere. It is significant, however, that communist PRC continued to export films to Singapore and Malaysia till the end of the 1950s, when these former British colonial territories got independence and banned the import of movies from the communist countries, including China.

Considering all the above, by the end of the 1950s, Shaw Brothers got a chance to fully establish its central role in the structure of Chinese pop culture becoming the largest Chinese language filmmaker in the world.

By the end of the 970s, the production of films declined whereas television gradually came to the center of attention both domestically and regionally. With the change in media industry's nature, Shaw Brothers switched its attentionfromfilm making to TV production, creating TVB - nowadays one of the two “free-to-air” TV stations established in Hong Kong. This led to the growth of the number of TV dramas produced in Hong Kong. TVB soon became a major producer and exporter of television dramas both for the domestic audience and for the world ethnic Chinese community.

It was really a strategic decision made by Shaw Brothers when it sensed that Hong Kong movies were on thedecline as they do not solve the problems of new generations of local citizens who were interested neither in history and politics of continental China nor in the overseas Chinese diaspora. Instead, TV dramas centered around the local issues became hugely popular and werecredited with promoting the revival of the Chinese commercial movie industry and with contributing to the growth of the Cantopop (Cantonese pop music)Curtin Michael. Media capital: Towards the Study of Spatial Flows // International Journal of Cultural Studies, 2003. - ¹6 (2). P. 217..

Starting from the 1990s, film making under independent creators has significantly decreased. However, Hong Kong is still considered to be the center for Chinese language cinema and continues to export its locally produced TV dramas to the Southeast Asian countries.

Besides Hong Kong, Taiwan also served as a producer of Chinese language TV dramas. In the 1980s, it exported traditional family-related costume dramas centered around the intrigues in big families living on Confucian principals.

However, after the success of the Taiwanese romantic drama “Meteor Garden” (Á÷Ðл¨Ô°) in 2000, which rewrote the plot of Japanese manga into a TV script, Taiwan also began to export contemporary television dramas.“Meteor Garden” became a huge success all across the East Asian region. It was aired in Hong Kong, Singapore and later in Korea. Although officially banned in Mainland China, it was still illegally watched on DVD.The main characters of the drama are four handsome college friends commonly known as F4. The success of the TV series paved the way for the main actors to the pop music stage. This resulted in the creation of the hottest boy band in the region known as “F4”. Although their singing skills were significantly limited, crowds of screaming fans followed them anywhere they went.Their success in East Asia gave birth to other boy bands and male singers from Taiwan who were actively marketedin the Chinese pop culture. Moreover, the popularity of “Meteor Garden” did not fade away leading to the creation of its Japanese (“Hana Yori Dango”,»¨¤è¤êÄÐ×Ó) and Korean (“Boys Over Flowers”,²Éº¸´Ù³²ÀÚ) versions which also became very popular across Asia. In 2018, a new version of “Meteor Garden” TV series was produced in China and also got very popular.

3.2 Pop Music Industry

As we mentioned above, TV dramas produced in Hong Kong fostered the growth of the Cantonese music industry. During the 1950s and 1960s, the Chinese language music production and creation of Chinese language singers were more “diffused”, including artists from Malaysia and Singapore. By the 1970s, however, the production began to concentrate in Hong Kong. In the 1980s, a new wave in popular musiccalled Cantonese pop music (also known as Cantopop) developed and came to a more than 10 years-domination on the Chinese language pop music stage.

During the 1980s, Cantopop dominated Chinese language radio stations all across the region turning many of the Cantonese pop singers into hugesuperstars not only in the music industry but in movies, as well. Even ethnic Chinese singers from other regions who could not understand or speak Cantonese sang songs in this dialect.

At that time, four singers rose to the top of the industry and became known as “The Four Heavenly Kings” (ËÄ´óÌìÍõ). They were Jacky Cheung (ÕÅѧÓÑ), Leon Lai (ÀèÃ÷),Andy Lau (ÁõµÂ»ª), and Aaron Kwok (¹ù¸»³Ç). Following the tendency, they were not only popular singers but widely known movie stars, as wellChua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 22..

However, starting in 1978, the economic liberalization of the People's Republic of China provoked radical changes in the pop music industry. By the end of the 1980s, following China's opening up and the oncominginclusion of Hong Kong into PRC as a Special Administrative Region, all major Hong Kong pop singers switched from Cantonese to Mandarin. Such a change was mostly due to the will to catch the massive Mainland China's potential marketIbidem..One of the great examples is a Beijing native singer Faye Wong (Íõ·Æ) who had to sing in Cantonese at the beginning of her career in Hong Kong but then returned to singing in her native Mandarin with great success.

The liberalization and commercialization of China's media industry have made Taiwan one of the greatest beneficiary in terms of Pop culture. The switch from Cantonese to Mandarin let Taipei become a center of Mandarin pop music industry and the main recording location for Mandopop. The rise of Mandarin pop music also gave way to the popularity of Taiwanese Mandarin pop singers. Among them is a native Taiwanese singerA-Mei (ÕÅ»ÝÃÃ) and the hottest Mandarin male vocalist of 2000s - Jay Chou (ÖܽÜÂ×), whose name is associated with the significant breakthrough in Mandopop switching from thedomination of romantic ballads to introducing R&B and rap linesChua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 23..

Taiwan also plays a significant role in educating, recording and selling the music of all the ethnic Chinese Mandarin singers across Southeast Asia. Notably, Malay and Singapore ethnic Chinese singers who desire to come into the Mandarin pop music world, first need to become successful in Taiwan.A great example is a Singaporean singer Stefanie Sun (ËïÑà×Ë) who won best female Mandarin vocalist at Golden Melody Awards in Taiwan in 2005 and was one of the most popular female Mandopop singers till the end of the first decade of the century.

The domination of Taiwan and Hong Kong in Chinese pop culture is represented in the widespread use of the term¸Ų̂ (“Gangtai”)to refer to thepart of contemporary Chinese-language entertainment culture. Literally, the characters ¸Û (“Kong” from “Hong Kong”) and ̨ (“Tai” from “Taiwan”) point out Mandarin pop music from these two regionsIbid. P. 4..

Besides the cultural inflow from other countries of the East Asian region, Chinese language pop music still dominates the Chinese popular culture. Any attempts by the Japanese or other East Asian pop musicians to strengthen their popularity and increase their share in the Chinese pop culture market would require them to perform duets with Chinese singers in English, or even sing in Mandarin.

According to the2018 overallalbum sales statisticsfrom the Chinese music streaming servicesQQMusic(QQÒôÀÖ), NetEaseMusic(ÍøÒ×ÔÆ), Xiami Music(ϺÃ×ÒôÀÖ), Kugou Music(¿á¹·ÒôÀÖ), KuwoMusic (¿áÎÒÒôÀÖ)., the top three positions are occupied by the Chinese singers, namely Lay (Zhang Yixing,ÕÅÒÕÐË), boy group “Nine Percent” (°Ù·Ö¾ÅÉÙÄê) and a rapper/singer Kris Wu (ÎâÒà·²)2018ÄêÖйúÊý×ÖÒôÀÖר¼­ÏúÁ¿ÅÅÐÐTOP10 (2018 Top 10 Music Album Sales in China) Retrieved February 13, 2019 from https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1621631009526098844&wfr=spider&for=pc.What is significant here is that Lay and Kris started their career in a Chinese sub-unit of a massive Korean pop group EXO. Moreover, Kris is actually a Canadian Chinese, raised in both countries, which makes him a multilingual artist who speaks Mandarin, English, Korean, and Cantonese (as he is originally from Guangdong province). For his part, Lay also speaks Chinese, English and perfect Korean. This is one of the very illustrative examples of the transnational character of the Chinese and East Asian popular culture and will be further discussed in detail in Chapter II of my thesis.

4. Multilingual Character of the Chinese Pop Culture

One of the significant features of the Chinese pop culture that is already noticeable from the discussion above is the multilingual character of the Chinese Pop culture.It means that there is more than one language/dialect that is used in cultural production.As Tay Jinna points out, although in recent years Mandarin has acquired the status of a “standardized” language of communication in PRC and among the ethnic Chinese (Huaren) population from other locations, analytically, it is, however,clear that in Chinese pop culture Mandarin does not have the avowed privilege to be the“official” language of all ethnic Chinese people from different regions Tay Jinna. Op. cit. P. 105-114..Chua Beng Huat also points out that since the start of pop culture flows within the ethnic Chinese-dominant locations in East Asia, the configuration of Chinese pop Culture has been “materially and symbolically without a center”Chua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 39.. According to him, any efforts to find a cultural center of it would be in vain.

The dominant spoken language varies in different places of cultural production and consumption: Cantonese in Hong Kong, Mandarin and Hokkien Taiwanese in Taiwan, while in Singapore all three languages had been widely used till the beginning of the 1970s when the use of dialects in mass media was prohibited by the government.

Pop culture from different locations with ethnic Chinese population tends to reflect the domination of the locally spoken dialect because its products are initially created for the local audience and are exported to other Huaren communities only after proving successful on the local market.For instance, the dialects,which are mostly used in pop music are Mandarin, Cantonese and Taiwanese, depending on the native language of a singer and the recording location. However, these factors are easily changeable as a singer can switch between dialects to suit different pop music markets.Thus, songs are often released in more than one Chinese language leading to the creation of different versions of one song, for instance, both in Mandarin and Cantonese. One of the greatest examples here is the artistic journey of the Taiwanese female singer Teresa Teng (µËÀö¾ý) who recorded songs in Mandarin, Taiwanese, Cantonese, Japanese, Indonesian and English, becoming a sensation in the East- and Southeast Asian region and one of the most successful singers originated from the Mandarin-speaking community.

Coming back to the multilingual situation, sometimes, especially in Taiwan and Southeast Asia, several dialects are used in the lyrics of one song. There is also a modern tendency to add English lines into Chinese language songs. This, however, might be due to the desire to conquer western, especially American, market.

For example, in October 2018, a famous Chinese singer, actor, producer and showman Lay (ÕÅÒÕÐË)released his third studio album called “Namanana” (or “Ãβ»ÂäÓêÁÖ” in Chinese). The album contained 22 tracks with 11 songs in Chinese and their 11 counterparts in English Herman Tamar. Lay Takes Fantastical Journey in 'NAMANANA' Music Video: Premiere // Billboard, November 19, 2018. Retrieved March 22, 2019 from https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/international/8480725/lay-fantastical-journey-namanana-video-premiere making his solo debut at Billboard 200 chart Benjamin Jeff. Lay Makes His Solo Debut on the Billboard 200 With New Album // Billboard, November 29, 2018. Retrieved March 22, 2019 from https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/k-town/8482309/lay-namanana-album-billboard-200-charts.The album peaked at #1 for two consecutive weeks starting fromNovember 3, 2018 Lay Chart History (World Albums) // Billboard. Retrieved March 22, 2019. URL: https://www.billboard.com/music/Lay/chart-history/world-albums/song/1104728.

The multilingual character of Chinese pop culture is also represented in the movie industry, where mixing different Chinese dialects in one film has become a more and more widespread phenomenon.Some of the examples of such mixing is the worldwide famous movie “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, directed by Taiwanese Ang Lee(Àî°²), where Mandarin is used along with various accents of actors from Mainland China, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Taiwan; a recent Hong Kong-Chinese action movie called “Project Gutenberg” (ÎÞË«) 2018,directed by Felix Chong (ׯÎÄÇ¿)., although is predominantly in Cantonese, featuring such superstar Hong Kong actors as Patrick Chow (ÖÜÈó·¢) and Aaron Kwok (¹ù¸»³Ç), still uses Mandarin in some episodes.

In a cultural sense, the multilingual character of Chinese pop culture poses an interesting question for its transnational perception. Firstly, in the case of movies and television, media product from one place using dialogues in its local language or dialect is often hard or impossible to comprehend for the consumersfrom another region. That is why the conversation needs to be providedwith subtitles written in the standard written Chinese script. Secondly, the same Chinese language can have various differentsocial, political and cultural status in different places of the Chinese pop culture. For example, Cantonese dialect (ÔÁÓï) which is dominant in Hong Kong, is the language of minorities in Singapore and almost absent in Taiwan.At the same time, Minnan (ÃöÄÏÓï) orFujian (¸£½¨) dialect, also known as Hokkien,has been accepted all over Taiwan as Taiwanese local language (̨Óï). Interestingly, the majority of the ethnic Chinese population of Singapore used to speak Hokkien as they were the descendants from the Fujian province of China. However, nowadays speakers of this language are socially marginalized and marked as not having much formal education.

This complexity ofcultural, social, and political status of different Chinese dialects across various regions leads to different readings and perception of the same cultural products (movies, dramas' plots and songs' lyrics). So using subtitles in the common written script is aimed at facilitating the overall reception of Chinese language pop culture products across the ethnic Chinese communities in different locations.

From the point of view of producers, the mixing of Chinese dialects along with English, Japanese or any other language, can become another tool for expanding their potential market. Thus, the phenomenon of the so-called “Pan-Chinese” or “Pan-Asian” films is widely spread nowadays. These productions are aimed at expanding the transnational audience, hoping that superstar cast from different countries will attract the corresponding local consumers.

However, the results do not always live up to the expectations, and the success of such movies can-not be predicted or guaranteed. Pan-Asian cinema cooperation has not achieved consistent success in box-office on the regional level so far. For example, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” was very well received in the West among the non-Chinese audience, while bothering some Chinese-speaking viewers with the difference in the leading actors' accents.

On the other hand, Zhang Yimou's (ÕÅÒÕı) 2002 wuxia movie “Hero” achieved phenomenal success in China and on the regional level, but was rather a failure in the Western market, managing to achieve only a half of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” foreign box-officeKwok Jenny. Hero: China's Response to Hollywood Globalization, Jump Cut // A Review of contemporary Media, Spring, 2007. - ¹49..

5. Chinese Pop Culture and the De-centering of Chinese Identity

The complicated structure of the Chinese pop culture with its well-established channels of communication and circulation of cultural products would inevitably raise a question of a so-called shared Chinese identity that all the ethnic Chinese communities included in this structure might have.

Thus, there have been various attempts to unite these ethnic Chinese communities creating the concept of “greater” “cultural” China on the basis of relatively stable shared culture and shared Confucian cultural heritage, in particular. Enormous efforts have been put into the discussions of Pan-Chinese economic success, Pan-Chinese culture and pan-Chinese identity, highly supported by the international Chinese business network and their “enthusiastic intellectual promotersChua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 32..

Undoubtedly, until the end of the 19^th century, this ethnic Chinese population abroad could be called “diaspora” because the majority of the population were the first generation immigrants who considered themselves as strangers and voyagers in the foreign land and continued to turn their attention to China which they considered their home.

“The ideological and emotional desire for a Confucian cultural China lives off the assumption that Confucianism constitutes the foundational culture of everyday life for all ethnic Chinese in the world”Ibid. P. 34..The main figure to advocate this position was the neo-Confucian philosopher Tu Weiming. His idea was that all the countries with the ethnic Chinese population have a shared history of common Confucian heritage which emerged in China. That is why they can be drawn together as “Cultural China”.This concept of “Cultural China” does not only imply considering China to be a cultural core but what is more important, gives a chance to reform Confucianism, which unites the dispersed Chinese communities abroad, as well as Japan and KoreaTu Weiming. Culture China: The periphery as the Centre. Daedulus 120, 1991. P. 1-32..However, nowadays calling ethnic Chinese population diasporic, which involves the existence of common home ornation can be very problematic.

Politically speaking, until 1949 being ethnic Chinese could be loosely equal to being a citizen of China. Guomindang's (¹úÃñµ³) retreat to Taiwan after its defeat in the Chinese civil war led to the divide between cultural ethnic Chinese identity and citizenship. Both PRC on the Continent and the Republic of China (ROC) in Taiwan claimed all ethnic Chinese as their citizens.

However, in 1955, the Mainland Chinese government renounced its claim on the overseas Chinese citizens and encouraged them to take the nationalities of their countries of stay, thus separating Chinese ethnicity and Chinese citizenship.Since then, different interpretations of the notions of“nationalities”and“citizenships” have complicated an identification as being Chinese through ethnicity or nationality.The term “Zhongguoren”(“Chinese” ÖйúÈË)has become an exclusive marker for citizens of the People's Republic of China while“Huaren” (“Chinese” »ªÈË) as ethnic-cultural marker couldbelong to any nationality Chua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 36..

For example, following the experience of Singapore, the term “Huaren”is likely to be adopted as a nationally neutral but “ethnically-and culturally-marked identity”Ibid. P. 37.. This reserves the term “Zhongguoren”(ÖйúÈË), exclusively for the citizens of the PRC.

As, Chua Beng Huat points out, “in this context, local sentiments have provided, and will continue to provide, the necessary ideological resources for constructions of difference between Huaren of different locations, rather than building on any idea of a shared `Chinese' culture”Chua Beng Huat. Op. cit. P. 37..

In contrast to the absence of a common great philosophical idea about the Chinese culture and identity, Huaren population of Mainland China, , Hong Kong,Taiwan, Singapore and other countries of East Asia have a long history of shared pop culture in different Chinese language dialects. As I already mentioned above, this flow of pop culture is facilitated by adding subtitles in a common standardized written script.