Fuel for South Korea’s “Global Dreams Factory”: The Desires of Parents Whose Children Dream of Becoming K-pop Stars

This paper is an ethnographic account of the desires and struggles of some parents in South Korea who invest - financially and emotionally - in their children’s dream of becoming K-pop stars in the hope of securing a better future for their young, and repositioning themselves more favorably in an extremely restrictive and competitive environment. It is based on personal interviews with 15 mothers and 8 fathers, and participation-observation of young South Koreans’activities in a private academy where they receive “professional training.” This study contends that these parents are strategically benchmarking and re-benchmarking their place within a rapidly changing society by following shifting trends of pursuits that have emerged as new measures of success and status, so that they would not be “left behind” by a rapidly globalizing society.