ANALYZING THE K-POP FAN CULTURE OF ALBUM DUMPING THROUGH ALIRALIRA’S THREADS

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the representation of throwing away K-pop albums (album dumping) as waste, in Aliralira’s threads, an Indonesian Korean interpreter and a famous Indonesian social media figure in K-Pop fandom. This study analyzes this phenomenon using mainly Cultural Studies and Semiotics analysis, which is used to analyze Aliralira's X viral threads. Album dumping is a phenomenon in the K-pop community specifically in South Korea, where fans would take photocards inside an album, which they consider the most valuable, and throw away the rest of the albums, including the posters, photo albums, and CDs. Consequently, this act led to the massive waste of albums in South Korea. Regarding this phenomenon, Aliralira’s tweets on the social media platform X represented and repackaged album dumping act to her Indonesian followers, by commenting and highlighting this behavior. By analyzing Aliralira's tweet's element, this study understood the act of throwing away the photocards reflect how South Korean cultural norm, or the resistance and deviation to it, are adapted for an Indonesian audience. The normalization of throwing away the rest of the album manifests a consumerist behavior shaped by ideology where fans accommodate the exploitative system while believing their actions reflect loyalty.