Global Imagination of K-Pop: Pop Music Fans’ Lived Experiences of Cultural Hybridity

Drawing on qualitative interviews with Canada-based K-pop (contemporary South Korean “idol pop” music) fans, this study discusses how transnational fans experience and interpret K-pop as a form of cultural hybridity that facilitates global imagination. In particular, the study explores how fans consume and translate transnational pop music while engaging with different modes of global imagination in their everyday lives. In so doing, the study contributes to a better understanding of the text and context of K-pop through the lens of audiences’ negotiation with globalization.