Introduction
Popular music studies in East Asia since the 2000s has taken a decidedly transnational and
inter-Asian turn. Inquiries into popular music scenes, audiences, stars, circulation, entertain-
ment industries, and genres attended to the globalization processes and trans-local interac-
tions. This hybrid consciousness partly grew out of the border-crossing realities of East Asian
popular music industries, practitioners, and fans. For example, J-pop, K-pop, Mandarin pop, and
various Westernized, nationalized, and industrialized forms of popular music have all experi-
enced regional popularity, albeit through different paths and intensity of mediation. While music
and entertainment industries have been the most visible structural players in market expansion
and talent grooming, colonial histories and deterritorialized production complicate the branded
purity of national popular music in East Asia.
Besides popular music’s border-crossing, the networking of popular music researchers—such
as the Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Group—was an important backdrop for introduc-
ing transnational and inter-Asian perspectives to popular music analysis. Communication and
collaborations among popular music scholars with an interest in East Asia have made visible the
internal power dynamics as well as parallel development in the region. In this section, we feature
two chapters that illustrate these respective themes.
In Chapter 8a, Hyunjoon Shin asks whether or not the globally successful K-pop can be
considered a form of subaltern cosmopolitan music. The question is raised in order to illus-
trate K-pop’s ambiguous integration into global music styles and production. Shin argues that
K-pop occupies at once a globally subaltern and a regionally dominant position. With multiple
Asian-market considerations, K-pop evolved into a cosmopolitan sound by adopting global
music industry styles, the visual currency of idols and dance, and international collaboration
influenced by the United States and Japan.
In contrast to Shin’s global mapping, Miaoju Jian traces site-specific stories of small, legendary
urban music venues in Taipei and Beijing—Underworld (1996–2013) and D22 (2006–2012).
For periods of time, both live venues grew independently into hubs of indie music perfor-
mances. Their stories, juxtaposed in Jian’s work, illuminate the internationalization of indie
music styles as well as the turn to cultural governance, which eventually depleted the subcultural
energy in both scenes.