After 18 years, $725, a biometric scan and a flight from Irvine to Sacramento, I was finally able to strip myself from my A(lien)-number. My parents weren’t there for my naturalization, but that’s okay — I wouldn’t have wanted them to sit through a recorded video of Donald Trump congratulating a room full of immigrants anyway. Nonetheless, it was fairly anticlimactic. I took a Lyft there, and then I came out of the McClellan Conference Center as a U.S. citizen. There’s privilege in my ambivalence, but it was always expected I would have to shed my Korean citizenship and become a naturalized, full-fledged American.
Despite this, and the fact I immigrated at the sprightly age of two, I’ve compressed my entire personality into my nationality. I love my culture and witnessing its increasing global proliferation through K-pop and K-dramas and introducing people to cuisine outside of Korean barbeque. But when I was younger, the only pieces of myself I could see on a stage were through my family’s shared Dell desktop at 5 a.m. when I could browse YouTube for K-pop music videos with English subtitles.
I found a bit of myself sandwiched between Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga with Ariana Grande during the Grammy nominations announcement on Nov. 24; the South Korean septet BTS is now Grammy nominated for their all-English disco pop track, “Dynamite.”
Admittedly, it’s disheartening to witness the artists I’ve grown into myself with have a Grammy nomination for a song that won’t be lyrically credited to their names. However, the members have stated time and time again that the track was fit sonically to be in English, not Korean. This was a musical and artistic choice on part of the members who envisioned “Dynamite” to be what it is.
“For this song, we wanted to go easy and simple and positive. Not … deep vibes or shadows,” the group’s leader RM said.
The single dropped in August after the entire world came to a shuddering break that no one foresaw. Its addictive beat paired with the “dyna-na-na” throughout its chorus makes it easy to listen to and sing along — the perfect remedy to those of us needing a break from the dreary monotony of the pandemic.
Member Jin also added, “world domination wasn’t actually our plan when we were releasing ‘Dynamite,’” dispelling murmurs on the internet accusing the South Korean group’s all-English track as a ploy for sales and general global appeal.
More importantly, the “deep vibes” and “shadows” RM lists are likely in reference to the album released prior to “Dynamite” and antedating shelter-in-place orders. The album, “Map of the Soul: 7,” is an emotional finale to their duology inspired by Jungian philosophy on the self and their seven-year journey as musicians. The album was submitted to multiple categories and was not nominated for a single Grammy despite its record blowing success in the first half of 2020.
There are still critics who view BTS as nothing more than products of a foreign and backwards music industry that sprung out of nowhere. The group first emerged on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2017 with “DNA,” “Boy With Luv” debuted at No. 8 in 2019 and just this year “ON” debuted at No. 4 on March 7. It wasn’t until this summer that the group broke through the metaphorical ceiling, debuting at No. 1 with “Dynamite.” This doesn’t include all the accolades the artists have accumulated in their home country since their debut in 2013.
BTS have had a clear and steady incline from South Korea to America on the charts, but have hardly received coverage as serious artists.
“Like most K-pop acts, the members of BTS find their lifestyles and freedom of expression tightly policed,” Olivia Carville wrote for Bloomberg.
Like most Western journalists, Carville attempts to collect clicks using the K-pop industry, which quite obviously mirrors the American music industry and paints the seven men as puppets.
She also claimed that the members don’t have tattoos when a quick Google search and anyone can see that multiple members have tattoos. In other terms of freedom of expression, their entire discography is drenched with the voices of each and every member. All are credited as writers and producers for their most recent album, “BE,” in addition to Jimin working as their project manager, V as the visual director and Jungkook directing the music video for their title track, “Life Goes On.”
Under researched articles like Carville’s aren’t uncommon as BTS have met their fair share of explicit racism and xenophobia.
Such stigmas against K-pop as industrialized, illegitimate music allowed the Video Music Awards to create the “Best K-Pop” category. The creation of the category and BTS’s subsequent win under it was a clear sign that this South Korean act was not welcome to encroach into existing categories awarded to artists who have, quite frankly, done much less. Time and time again, BTS are othered from Western musicians and minimized as a fad powered by their large fan-base.
“I think the Grammys … are the final part of the American journey,” RM said.
I agree. However, just as I walked out of the McClellan Conference Center with my freshly printed certificate of citizenship and tiny American flag smashed in one hand, I still felt just as alien as I had before.
Even if BTS emerge victorious in January with a Grammy, the long-standing racist institution will likely continue to be unaccepting of their Korean works. This is what makes the potential of “Dynamite” as a Grammy awarded track bittersweet as a fan, but especially bitter as a South Korean woman whose entire life has been defined by American markers of success. BTS are living proof of the impossible heights people of color must achieve to be rewarded and respected at the same level of white Americans, and a Grammy won’t change that.
Jin Hee Park is a 2020-2021 Opinion Co-Editor. She can be reached at opinion@newuniversity.org.