In small groups, students explored a musical selection by the group and analyzed the melody, lyrics, and visual effects to engage with ideas of globalization and better understand the dynamics of exporting Korean culture while importing foreign influences into their productions. 

One example included connecting 2017’s “Spring Day” to a possible critique of the South Korean government’s response to the 2014 Sewol Ferry disaster that resulted in the deaths of high school students. Another group examined the ways in which BTS’s 2018 song “Idol” highlighted Korean nationalism and instrumentation within its lyrical proclamation of self-love. 

Other groups looked at themes that included generation tensions around increasingly-limited socio-economic mobility, seeking peace at a time of perpetual conflict, and challenges to notions of Western masculinity and gender identity. 

The students connected their songs with the ways in which BTS as a group, and perhaps South Korea more generally, exert forms of soft power in a quest to boost the country’s image and exportation of national culture. 

Story submitted by HS history teacher Dr. Shira Kohn.