A. Group Members
Our team is consists of three SNU students who interests in subculture ; especially ‘Super fan of famous stars’. To introduce our members : Choo Joon Ho (Majoring in Geographic Education), An Min Sook (Majoring in Liberal studies), Lee Seung Woo (Majoring in Liberal studies)
B. Project Topic : Super fans of famous stars
Our group is focused on researching super fans, especially of famous stars. In Korean, it is common to find teenagers or young guys/girls who really like certain stars. They are even sometimes frantic about their singers, movie stars, etc,. Some run online fan sites, see off their stars at the airport, and post them on the internet. Still, in real life, their identities are often hidden not being revealed - because of several stereotypes that common people have. Our group decided to research them, interview them to try to understand as they are.
C. Common Stereotypes & Labels about Super fans of Idols
1) Super fans have difficulties in conducting their daily routines (e.g. studying) because of supporting stars.
2) Super fans spend too much money that they sometimes cannot afford, to support stars.
3) Super fans remembers the anniversaries of their stars more than themselves' family birthdays or anniversaries.
4) Super fans get indirect happiness or pleasure though their stars, or they do.
5) Super fans often feel shameful to reveal that they are super fans of som stars.
6) Super fans are actually those people who have lack of affection from deep in the mind and they are craving to feel love by doing activities for stars.
7) Super fans hate the other stars who are competitive or rivals of their stars, without proper reasons.
8) Super fans are keen to know every schedule of their stars' schedule, even though it's private.
9) Super fans' social activities are concentrated on participating in the gathering of the fan club members.
10) Super fans admire their stars abnormally or even worship them.
E. Preliminary Research
1)
(33mins ~ 44mins)
: The evolution of fandom. (Exo’s extreme fan and fandom’s characteristics nowadays)
-This video shows the evolution of fandom. Nowadays, many super fans want to be assimilated with Stars. For examples in the video, superfans want to experience same time which their stars had experienced. Moreover, they want to commemorate their stars by doing some social donation. It seems that every superfan is not that negative. But, it is quite sure that superfan’s life is effected by their stars.
2)
-It is the Dictionary definition of ‘Sasaeng fan’ : The superfan who is highly obsessed with their stars, almost like stalker.
3)
-This article shows the emergence of new trend ‘Madonna wannabe’ ; the person who wants to dress like ‘Madonna’.
4)
-Many superfans lose their life’s balance cause of their stars. They lose lots of money and time to follow their fans. So, they sometimes commit a crime for their survive. In that case, it is confused that do we have to concede that they are the fans of stars? Or just a ‘Stalker’?
F. Our Plan
We are going to find some super fans of stars at least two to interview and we will also find at least one or two who are acquainces of super fans as their family member or friend. In two weeks(the second week of October), our interview must be finished then. In three weeks(the third week of October), we will conduct additional interview if necessary or tidy up informations we get from the previous interview. Then we will have our presentation in our class. We will try to keep objective viewpoint when we carry interviews with super fans. We hope it to be useful and interesting experience for all of our classmates.
