As the saying goes, 'a terrible hybrid', in our society, the word 'hybrid' is still often used in a negative sense.
But the cultures of all empires, such as Persia and Rome, were hybrids.
Cultural colonies influenced by empires can subvert cultural power by fostering hybridity and thereby breaking down the boundaries between empire and colony.
As postcolonial scholar Homi Bhabha (1949~) has said, purity is merely a myth, and new forms of identity can emerge from hybridity, the “third space,” and these hybrid identities are inherently fluid, dynamic, and adaptable, giving rise to something new and innovative.
---From "Introduction - A Strange and Beautiful Country of Hybrids Seen Through the Eyes of a Hybrid Generation"

Capitalism replacing religion is a global phenomenon.
The reason why “Parasite” swept the Palme d’Or (Best Picture) at the Cannes Film Festival in France and the Academy Award for Best Picture in the U.S. is because it garnered sympathy from people around the world by cleverly portraying the phenomenon through spatial symbolism (a mansion on a hill, a semi-basement, an underground bunker) and black humor.
However, this phenomenon is particularly prominent among young people in Korea.
This is because the rejection of Confucianism, which dominated the Korean Peninsula for over 500 years, especially Joseon-style Neo-Confucianism, has rapidly increased, and the problems revealed in recent years by the 86 Generation movement, the successors to Confucianism, have further fueled the antipathy of the youth.
---From “Because they’re rich, they’re good” - Capitalism that replaced religion

I don't know when it started, but Korean society these days, especially the 1020 generation that was crazy about Mr. Song, seems to admire and revere innate wealth as if it were a talent.
It's been a long time since the whole nation was moved and excited by the story of a track and field athlete who trained by eating only ramen because he was so poor in the 1980s.
Even in the case of a top star singer who debuted in the 2000s, one of the reasons his popularity plummeted was because he “emphasized his extreme poverty as a child and his struggles so much that it felt like listening to a lecture from an old fart.”
Nowadays, many people find vicariously satisfying watching the "Young and Rich" celebrities who were born with wealth and naturally consume luxury goods, rather than the self-made success stories that put pressure on them to "work hard."

This is the reality that the American economist Thorstein Veblen (1857-1929) sharply criticized, which is the leisure class that avoids working hard and their conspicuous consumption that they admire and worship.
In times when the economic and social structure is dynamic, venture startups and professional jobs are in the spotlight, and social mobility is active, Veblen's theory of the leisure class tends to lose relative power due to the admiration for the "hard-working rich." However, the fact that the theory of the leisure class is now gaining strength is evidence that the current economic and social structure is not like that.

---From "Golden Spoon Marketing - The Era of Making Money by Showing Off Money"

Pessimism and victim mentality are also connected to the fact that most web novels about the return of the throne are revenge stories.
Drama critic Shin Joo-jin's diagnosis is that revenge dramas have been noticeably increasing in Korean TV dramas since 2000, including dramas based on web novels like "The Youngest Son of a Chaebol Family."
One of the reasons is that the sense of victimization that "I am living an unfair life" has spread throughout society due to the unstable employment environment and widening gap between the rich and the poor since the 1997 foreign exchange crisis.
Revenge dramas “reflect the reality of today’s society, which is becoming increasingly devastated by endless competition, and at the same time, revenge dramas themselves are a powerful emotional outburst and a proxy mechanism for resolution of such social reality” (Shin Ju-jin, “A Study on the Transitional Structure of ‘Revenge Affect’” (2018)).

In the case of the Netflix original drama "The Glory" (2022-2023), which became a global hit, the issue of school violence was added to the issue of class.
The protagonist, a child from a poor family, is not protected by the school or public authorities even if he or she becomes a victim of school violence, and the child from a wealthy family is not properly punished even if he or she becomes the perpetrator.
Although it contains dramatic exaggeration, it also reflects real concerns and dissatisfaction with the fact that social mobility is becoming more difficult and class systems are becoming more entrenched in Korean society.
On the other hand, you can also look at it this way.
As discontent grows over the "soft punishment" for violent crimes, private revenge content is on the rise and gaining popularity.
For example, revenge tragedy became popular during the English Renaissance under Elizabeth I, which scholars attribute to the strengthened prohibition on private revenge.
The hallmark of these revenge dramas is that there is a lot of bloodshed, most of the characters die, and in particular, both the target of revenge and the one taking revenge die.
In this respect, William Shakespeare's (1564-1616) masterpiece Hamlet (1601) is also classified as a revenge play.
---From "The Return of the King and K-Revenge - How the Gaming Generation Turned Their Lives Around"

The reason why “Squid Game” became a global success is not because it introduced the most Korean game.
This is because by mixing the unfamiliar and the familiar, and making a child's play that is easy for anyone to understand into a life-or-death game, the viewer becomes more immersed and feels a cruel irony.
[…] In short, “Squid Game” is a content that appeals to a global audience by ingeniously combining universal and local elements, clichéd and original elements.
The technology of this combination has been strongly influenced by the American film industry, which has led the way up to now.
So, rather than being the most Korean, "Squid Game" is in some ways quite Hollywood-like, and it can be seen as doing what Hollywood has been doing better.
---From "Chicken and the Squid Game - Is it truly the most Korean and therefore the most global?"

Can the moon jar simply be called "ancient"? Even the white porcelain jars made in the 18th century were reborn as "modern products" under the name "moon jar."
It's not just because of the naming.
In the late Joseon Dynasty, it was just one of many types of white porcelain vessels.
However, in modern times, it has come to have the aesthetic meaning of “the pinnacle of Korean beauty.”


However, the aesthetic adjectives that are often attached to moon jars, such as “simplicity,” “the beauty of white,” and “the beauty of natural distortion,” were actually first mentioned as characteristics of Joseon white porcelain by art critic Yanagi Muneyoshi (1889-1961) during the Japanese colonial period.
The current moon jar aesthetic was created by Korean artists and critics who simultaneously accepted and overcame Yanagi.
[…] However, Yanagi later drew backlash by defining Joseon’s beauty as a passive “beauty of sorrow.”
Yanagi pointed out that the small base of the Joseon jar compared to its body showed a “loss of stability” and that it unconsciously reflected “the suffering and sorrow experienced by a people” who could not stay grounded on the ground.


On the other hand, Kim Hwan-ki regarded the small heel of the moon jar as “the avant-garde of modern art.”
It is quite exquisite that he compared Joseon white porcelain to the buildings of Le Corbusier, a master of modern architecture.
The pilotis (buildings built on columns standing in an open space to separate them from the ground), a characteristic of Le Corbusier's architecture, fit well with the unique form of the moon jar, which Kim Hwan-ki described as "narrow-bottomed and almost floating."
Instead of seeing “sadness” like Yanagi in the narrow heel of the moon jar, Kim Hwan-ki saw freedom and the spirit of the avant-garde.
The history of this aesthetic discourse is behind the moon jar becoming an icon of Korean beauty.
I dare say that the Moon Jar is the best example of branding in Korean cultural history, combining philosophy and emotion.
---From "Moon Jar - The Best Branding Success Story"

It is worth referring to the German documentary Kunst in Bewegung (Art in Motion) (2004).
A documentary about how Western art, meant to commemorate something, has fallen into a lower and lower place.
The pedestals of tall statues have been lowered, and through Rodin's low pedestal sculptures, sculptures without pedestals at all have appeared, and instead of sculptures, works have emerged that induce memories through abstract media such as letters laid on the floor.

[…] The movement to move away from authoritative monuments, including statues of traditional forms, has become even stronger in the 21st century, but it is ironic that Korea is diligently continuing this old tradition that was not originally ours.
Statues of great figures from the 1960s and 1970s could be seen as products of a transitional period in history, but even in the 21st century, Korean government officials and organizations are still obsessed with statues.
Is it really necessary to erect a giant, out-of-place statue of a Joseon Dynasty figure in front of his birthplace, historic site, or traditional Korean house, without even knowing what he actually looked like? Should we even commemorate Gangnam Style and other Hallyu dramas with such enormous, utterly unattractive statues?
---From "Statues - Korea, where everything is turned into statues"

Legal disputes surrounding the copyright of learning data for generative artificial intelligence are a global phenomenon, and governments around the world, including Korea, are pursuing legislation.
Even if it is insufficient, this problem can be solved to some extent through laws and regulations.
A bigger and more serious problem is the extreme polarization that the future world of artificial intelligence will bring.
I've interviewed experts while writing several articles on artificial intelligence, and they all sounded concerned about the polarization that will emerge across the industry.
For artists who have already established themselves in the popular webtoon industry, not to mention pure art, with their unique content and drawing style, artificial intelligence, far from being a threat, can actually be a beneficial tool.
The problem is that only a few of them will survive, while the majority of writers who lack such capabilities will be driven out by artificial intelligence.

You might ask, isn't the problem that we can't actively utilize AI and develop the capacity to compete with it?
However, among the writers who have not yet developed their abilities, there are many young writers who do not know how they will grow in the future.
If the pool of creators itself shrinks too much, the opportunities for future masters to emerge also decrease.
We are now facing a huge social challenge.

---From "Generative Artificial Intelligence and Polarization - The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on the Birth of Masters"