• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.98-115
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• 2022

The purpose of study was to analyze the process of accepting by BTS fans. The methodology used in this study was qualitative research using grounded theory and the results of the study follow. As a result of open coding, 47 concepts, 23 subcategories, and 14 categories were derived. In the axis coding stage, the casual conditions were "Recognition of BTS image," "Fascinated by BTS image," "Simple consumption of BTS image," and "Arising and expansion of curiosity about BTS image." The contextual conditions were "Accessibility of BTS image" and "Abundance of BTS image searching paths." The central phenomenon appeared to be "Immersing and studying BTS image." The arbitration conditions were "Capabilities required to reproduce BTS image" and "Motivation for contributing BTS image." The actions/interactions were "Presenting BTS image," "Contribution to the spread of BTS image," and "Involved in forming new BTS image." The result was "Emergence and expansion of new BTS image meaning" and "Strengthening attachment to BTS." Through process analysis, it was found that acceptance of BTS images consisted of five stages: "Recognition of BTS image," "Becoming curious about BTS image," "Searching BTS image," "Intervention of BTS image." and "Reproduction of BTS image." As a result of deriving the core categories through selective coding, the core category was "Forming a bond while participating in the BTS image."

• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.114-130
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• 2021

The purpose of this study is to analysis BTS's image based on Peirce's semiotics. Methodologies of this study are literature study to analyze the structure of idol image based on Peirce's theory of signs, case study and FGI analyzing the semiotic characteristics of BTS images. The research results of analyzing the semiotic features of BTS images by period of the BTS album are as follows. First, in the early days of their debut, they emphasized the image of hip-hop and expressed their will to resist and rebel against the older generation with a challenging and strong image. Second, during the 'The most beautiful day of life' period, image of wandering, rebellion, growth, and youth of teenagers was expressed. Third, in the 'Love Yourself' period, BTS showed various image changes between natural and pure image to splendid image by expressing the process of finding confidence during chaotic moment of growing. Fourth, during the 'Map of the Soul' period, the exploration and reflection on themselves were expressed in an outwardly splendid and bright manner, while at the same time expressing the inner darkness in a contrasting manner. Fifth, in the 'pandemic period', they expressed hopeful energy and willness with the image of mature and attractive man and bright and casual image. Their growth and change have been directly linked to the change of their image, and their image showed a successful signification with complementary combination of icons, indexes, and symbols.

• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.88-101
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• 2020

The music videos of BTS go beyond the limit of media promoting music and shows their meaning in various ways and complete the visual message of music through fashion style. BTS' fashion style in the music videos shows a change in symbolic representation of the genre of each album and song, of which gender images are changing aligned with the music messages of BTS. The purpose of this study was to derive gender images of fashion style in BTS music videos and to interpret their meaning based on Judith Butler's theory that performativity creates discourse through iterative process. It is conducted as a research method, an analytical study was conducted in parallel with literature studies and empirical case analysis. The scope of the study was limited to 301 costumes that appeared in 21 official music videos from debut single album '2Cool 4 Skool' released in 2013 to the mini album 'Map of the Soul: Persona' released in 2019. As a result of the analysis, the controversial fashion style, challenging fashion style, boyish fashion style, hybrid fashion style, the playful fashion style were revealed. The conclusion of studying the gender image of BTS, interpreted by this analysis using Judith Butler's theory, is as follows. The gender image of BTS is the traditional image that identifies with the dominant gender discourse, the resistive gender image that intentionally distances mainstream culture, the eclectic image parodying the gender of the opposing term, and the deconstructive image that transcends the dominant gender discourse.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.79-101
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• 2021

With the steady rise in global popularity of the Korean music group BTS, the South Korean government and surrounding industries have swiftly begun utilizing their image and international recognition for specific nation branding purposes. While K-pop soft power strategies are not novel to the South Korean state, what is new is the rapid speed at which BTS have become a beacon for South Korean culture, language, and symbolism in the international arena. However, few scholarly works have sought to investigate the role fans have played in this heightened position for the group as state representatives, with minimal research conducted into the work fans do within the framework of ARMY fan culture. This paper will thus aim to fill the gap in scholarship on ARMY as an organized labour network, focusing on the role fans play as labourers in online spaces that work to promote, disseminate, and cultivate wider recognition for BTS as artists. Through the conjunct engagement of a political economy framework and theories of participatory culture, this paper will explore the manner through which the free labour of ARMY, premised on affect, has constructed the fandom as active agents of soft power alongside BTS themselves.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.21 no.9
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• pp.310-320
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• 2020

BTS has established itself as a leading Korean popular music group in the global mainstream music market. In addition, BTS's fashion style is receiving so much attention that it is featured in the social networks of foreign media and the public. The purpose of this study considers BTS' fashion trends based on the analysis of their fashion styles. The methods and scope of this study have been combined with theoretical studies related to the fashion impact of BTS and BTS, as well as content analysis studies based on the image of BTS over the last five years. The results of this study are as follows. First, it was found that they pursue classic and modern styles through suits that emphasize straight silhouettes, the use of achromatic colors, and simplified decorations. Second, it has been shown that BTS prefers a casual style of free-spirited and comfortable sensibility by matching a jacket with a round shoulder line, toned-down skinny jeans, hood T-shirts, lettering patterns, and vivid colors. Third, BTS pursues a dynamic and active sporty style by utilizing the sleeveless basketball shirts, round neckline baseball shirts and shorts, training pants, and overfit sweatshirts with an emphasis on lettering patterns.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.27-45
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• 2021

This study examines the effects of celebrity endorsed advertising from a new perspective of the prior research that emphasizes the matchup between the brand and the celebrity. Due to the recent sharing experiences of the celebrity and their fans on SNS, it is hypothesized that the shared stories would impact viewers' responses that are often expressed in their likes, dislikes, shares and comments on SNS. In this study, the episodic type of advertising is hypothesized to have more favorable and active responses from viewers than the typical celebrity image-focused ads would have. By crawling and analyzing viewers' responses on YouTube toward 12 BTS endorsed ads, the hypotheses are confirmed as higher ratio of likes, lower ratio of dislikes and significantly higher ratio of comments over both total views and total likes were found. For the rationale behind, total 1800 comments were categorized into 4 major content types such as attached, experiential, empathic and self-related ones that are all considered as important factors influencing the strong ad effect. The results showed that the episodic ads have marginally more emotional comments than the celeb image ads. The difference was only found in experiential and empathic responses but not in self-related responses. Contrary to the hypothesis, the comments expressing attachment were found more for the celebrity image-focused ads than the episodic ones. It does not seem to suggest that the celebrity image focused ads are better to capture viewers' attachment towards the celebrity and the ad endorsed, but that the episodic ads draw viewers into relatively deeper level of attachment such as empathy by perceiving the authenticity of the celebrity and the brand. In conclusion, the shared stories on SNS can be a factor in the match-up theory on celebrity endorsed ad effects.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.726-743
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• 2021

This study tried to examine the fashion design and style of representative K-Pop boy groups BTS and SEVENTEEN appearing on music shows. The data collection was conducted on 4 music programs(Inkigayo, Music Bank, Show! Music Core, M COUNTDOWN) and YouTube(www.youtube.com) for each boy who worked for 5 years from January 2016 to December 2020. Result analysis utilized the stage scenes and music videos of the title songs of BTS and Seventeen. As for the fashion design and style characteristics of BTS, it was found that overall, the color, pattern, and decoration of the bottom were minimized, and the style was changed mainly by the top of the denim pants. As for Seventeen's fashion design and style characteristics, it was analyzed that plain simple slacks, bright and modest chromatic colors, and geometric and stylistic patterns with street retro sensibility were relatively emphasized, and natural and romantic images appeared a lot. As a result of examining the differences in fashion design and style characteristics between BTS and Seventeen, significant differences were found in color, tone, color scheme, material type, material combination, detail, trimming, pattern, accessories, and fashion image. Overall, it was found that both groups minimized the use of decorative elements such as patterns, details, and trimmings.

• Journal of Public Diplomacy
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.1-19
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• 2023

Objectives: This study aims to discover how the spread of K-POP and the diversification of the Korean Wave affects Korea's national reputation. K-POP stars are diversifying their interactions with fandom by creating an online space to consume various products and services related to their stars and engage in fan activities. Because of this, this study aims to examine the relevance of K-POP to national reputation through a parasocial relationship with K-POP stars by fandom forming a community and utilizing media. Methods: An online survey was conducted in English using the Amazon survey company Mechanical Turk for BTS fans living in the United States. A total of 195 people's data, excluding incomplete responses, were used for the analysis. Results: It was found that BTS fans' social media participation activities themselves did not directly affect Korea's national reputation. But the mediating effect of BTS fans' parasocial relationship was found. That is, BTS fans' social media participation activities had a positive effect on their parasocial relationships with BTS which in turn had a positive effect on their national reputation. Conlusions: The use and participation of BTS fans in social media in Korea's national reputation has no significant effect on itself, but it has been found that it affects the national reputation through forming parasocial relationships. From the study results, the parasocial relationship of K-POP fans can be used as a strategic mechanism to enhance the national image and Korea's national reputation.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.164-167
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• 2004

This study was carried out to investigate in vitro fertilization and development of in vitro matured pig oocytes inseminated with the Duroc boar sperm by different sperm washing media after thawing of the 5 ml frozen straws. Immature follicular oocytes (30-40) were transferred into each well of a Nunc 4-well multidish containing $500{\mu}l$ mTCM199 maturation medium. The sperm rich portion of ejaculates was collected into a 250 ml insulated vacuum bottle and gradually cooled 22 to $24^{\circ}C$ over a 2 h period. Semen was centrifuged at 800 g for 10 min and the seminal plasma discarded. Sperm were esuspended in a lactose-egg yolk and N-acetyl-Dglucosamine (LEN) diluent to contain $1{\times}10^{9}$ sperm/ml and cooled to $5^{\circ}C$ over a 2 h period. Immediately before freezing, semen was rediluted with an equal volume of LEN+4% glycerol and packed into 5 ml straws. After thawing of the 5 ml straw, the 5 ml semen was diluted with 20 ml Beltsville thawing solution (BTS) at room temperature. Oocytes were inseminated with untreated (unwashed and nonpreincubated) or treated sperm (washed two times in BTS, mTLP-PVA and mTBM media, respectively and nonpreincubated) with $2{\times}10^{7}$ sperm concentration. Oocytes were coincubated for 6 h in $500{\mu}l$ mTBM fertilization. At 6 h after IVF, oocytes were transferred into $500{\mu}l$ NCSU-23 culture medium for further culture of 6 h. Sperm penetration, polyspermy and male pronuclear formation of oocytes at 12 h after IVF and developmental ability of oocytes at 48 h after IVF were evaluated. Sperm penetration rate, male pronuclear formation and rate of cleaved embryos were higher in the BTS, mTLP-PVA and mTBM treatments than the unwashed treatment (p<0.05). The rate of blastocysts from the cleaved oocytes (2-4 cell stage) were higher in the mTLP-PVA treatment than in the unwashed, BTS and mTBM treatments. In conclusion, we recommend the washing of frozen-thawed sperm with mTLP-PVA medium before in vitro fertilization of oocytes in mTBM medium.

• Proceedings of the KSAR Conference
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• 2001.03a
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• pp.77-77
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• 2001

본 연구는 돼지 동결정액의 번식성적을 개선코자 기존의 maxi-straw와 cryogenic-vial을 이용하여 포장방법에 따른 동결방법과 융해방법별 정액성상 및 번식성적을 비교하였다. 동결방법은 두 가지 포장방법 모두 정액의 양(5$m\ell$)과 농도(5.0$\times$$10^{9}$/dose)가 동일한 조건으로 처리하였으며, LYE(Lactose egg york extender) 보존액으로 희석하여 액체질소 상단 15cm에서 20분간 동결하였다. 융해방법은 maxi-straw는 52$^{\circ}C$에서 45초간 cryogenic-vial은 52$^{\circ}C$에서 190초간 융해하여 $25^{\circ}C$로 가온 된 80$m\ell$ BTS (Beltsville thawing solution) 보존액과 혼합하였다. 정액성상검사는 정자자동분석기(SAIS : Sperm Analysis Image System, Korea)를 이용하였다. 총활력(TM : Total motility)과 정자의 빠르기(VCL : Curve linear velocity)는 maxi-straw가 54.3%와 46.6%로 cryogenic-vial의 35.6%와 36.6%보다 우수하였다(P<0.05). 정자의 직진성(STR : Straightness)과 NAR은 maxi-straw가 53.2%와 32.6%로 cryogenic-vial의 47.3%와 29.8%와 비슷한 경향을 나타내었다. 수태율과 분만율 및 총산자수는 maxi-straw가 77.3%, 68.2% 및 8.0두로 조사되어 cryogenic-vial포장방법의 66.7%, 61.9% 및 7.4두보다 다소 우수하였으나 통계적인 유의차는 인정되지 않았다. 이상의 결과로 볼 때 cryogenic-vial방법이 새로운 돼지 동결정액 포장방법의 가능성을 나타낸다고 사료된다.