ABSTRACT
Interest in Korean cosmetics, cuisine, tourism, and the language has been attributed to Hallyu's success. This chapter shows how social media plays a critical role in popularising other aspects of Korean culture, so that there is “active uptake”. That is, rather than simply watching a film or television drama where particular Korean dishes happen to be featured, for example, viewers may be motivated to seek out opportunities to taste the dishes themselves. There is a form of chain consumption where initial interest in music or dramas leads on to interest in food, locales, fashion, and even the language itself. Drawing on the notion of sociolinguistic consumption, which distinguishes between the direct consumption of languages as denotational codes (e.g. “I want to learn the French language”) and the indirect consumption of linguistic repertoires as a result of being engaged in various activities such as listening to K-pop or having an interest in wine (e.g. “I picked up some French words because I enjoy tasting different kinds of wine”), the chapter shows that social media plays a critical role in popularising other aspects of Korean culture, so that there is “active uptake”.
