Campus Conversations

Gangnam Style!

November 10, 2012

Blogger: David Sacci

It’s my senior year at Oxy and I’m afraid that it’s all going too fast. I had the opportunity to spend a Gangnam Style Halloween with PSY. Except not really. I got lucky with regard to the timing of one of my classes, Modern Korea. On the first day of class in September, my professor wanted to illustrate the time period that the course would be covering, so he played two videos. The fist was an old black and white short film of a Korean woman playing music. She was in a traditional dress sitting down in her home playing what appeared to be a horizontally opposed harp. In contrast, a moment after the first film ended my professor screened the Gangnam Style music video, which by that point had around 100 million views.

By now you’ve probably heard of international K-Pop sensation PSY and his hit song Gangnam Style. I’ve never forget where I was when I first saw the music video. Is it strange that I’ve bookmarked that moment in history as a significant event? Probably. As of Friday November 2, 2012 PSY’s biggest hit has been viewed roughly 623 million times, which makes it the 2nd most watched video on YouTube, of all time.

How does this all relate to Oxy? My professor for Modern Korea, the very one who screened PSY’s video on the first day of class, decided to dress like PSY for Halloween. So the students in class all got a good chuckle and I got an incredible photo of me dancing the “horsey dance” with a PSY lookalike.

Back to timing though: I couldn’t have chosen a better time to learn about Korean history. I’m living in a country where, at the moment, South Korean culture is widely present and extremely influential. Cars from South Korean automakers like Hyundai and Kia are some of the best on the market and are frequently seen on U.S. streets. Smartphones, tablets and laptops from large South Korean conglomerates like Samsung and LG occupy the pockets and messenger bags of many Americans. Not to mention that Gangnam Style frequently plays on Top 40 radio stations. I’m currently learning about the recent history of the Korean that would later yield this export of culture.

On a completely tangent note, for lunch on Friday the Marketplace served sea bass with sweet potato and ginger pure topped with crispy fried shallots. It was incredibly delicious.