This cultural-interpretive essay offers critical commentary on Koreanness, racial ideology, hegemonic racial power, and racialized cultural taste with the aim of interpreting the sport–music nexus by examining a case of the interface between music and sport: The authors focus on the case of the Olympic ice dance that the South Korean team performed for the Korean traditional folk song Arirang at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games. The authors argue that music and sport can be understood as a semiological system that shapes non-Whites’ ideological belief system. In addition, this essay engages with a discussion of cultural classification that often racializes skaters of color as the aforementioned are informed by Orientalism.
The purpose of this study was to understand the lived experiences of Korean American fans of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Korean pitcher Hyun-Jin Ryu. Two research questions were developed to guide the study: (a) How are participants’ ethnic identity perceptions as Korean Americans intertwined with their fanship to Hyun-Jin Ryu? and (b) How are participants’ lived experiences intertwined with their fanship to Ryu? The study focused on the details of how fans perceived their ethnic identity in relation to Ryu’s performance and presence in Major League Baseball. Findings revealed that fans initially became involved due to their ethnic ties to Ryu and remained as fans because they felt connected to the motherland of Korea. Fans individually identified with Ryu through the perceived minority status of being Korean American in the US. Fans experienced vicarious satisfaction as they felt Ryu broke racial, ethnic, and gender stereotypes through his body image and physical performance. Consequently, they developed Korean pride when Ryu performed well. This study extends Tajfel and Turner’s social identity theory and Phinney’s concept of ethnic identity to examine fanship to a specific player rather than a team.
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