Androgyny and Pop Culture

[Zoey McKinney]

Professor Jung-Kim touched on K-Pop and how it reflects (or affects) standards of beauty. Like many of you, I have a lot of students (and a little sister) who are big fans of K-Pop. In fact, one of my students gave me this BTS poster as a gift, which I immediately thought of when Professor Jung-Kim mentioned "flower boys". I thought it was so interesting how feminine this poster was. The flower background is straight out of a romance novel, but the members of the group are not the masculine romance novel ideal. They are very "soft" and feminized, and display some of the androgyny that was discussed today. I think it is interesting how androgyny and gender non-conformity are also showing up in Western pop culture more often, and I wonder how much of that is due to the influence of East Asian pop culture. I'm also thinking about the intended audience of these K-Pop and K-drama androgynous celebrities. These products are definitely consumed mostly by women, probably young women and girls. I'm curious about music and film aimed at boys or men. Do those celebrities have the same soft look, or are they more traditionally masculine?