Birth of Korean Cool: How One Nation Is Conquering the World Through Pop Culture

A FRESH FUNNY UP-CLOSE LOOK AT HOW SOUTH KOREA REMADE ITSELF AS THE WORLD'S POP CULTURE POWERHOUSE OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY By now everyone in the world knows the song Gangnam Style and Psy an instantly recognizable star. But the song's international popularity is no passing fad. Gangnam Style is only one tool in South Korea's extraordinarily elaborate and effective strategy to become a major world superpower by first becoming the world's number one pop culture exporter. As a child Euny Hong moved from America to the Gangnam neighbourhood in Seoul. She was a witness to the most acceler ated part of South Korea's economic development during which time it leapfrogged from third-world military dictatorship to first-world liberal democracy on the cutting edge of global technology. Euny Hong recounts how South Korea vaulted itself into the twenty-first century becoming a global leader in business technology education and pop culture. Featuring lively in-depth reporting and numerous interviews with Koreans working in all areas of government and society The Birth of Korean Cool reveals how a really uncool country became cool and how a nation that once banned miniskirts long hair on men and rock 'n' roll could come to mass produce boy bands soap operas and the world's most important smart phone.