O consumo de hábitos culturais asiáticos em Aracaju : o fandom do BTS e a construção de identidades juvenis

Abstract

This undergraduate thesis analyzes the material consumption and the consumption of Asian cultural habits within the youth context of the city of Aracaju, Brazil, based on the fandom of the South Korean group BTS and its impacts on the construction of youth identities. By understanding fandom as a hybrid space of sociability and cultural mediation, the study investigates how consumption practices associated with music, language, aesthetics, and Asian cultural products go beyond the economic dimension and, through affect, acquire symbolic, affective, and identity-related meanings. Methodologically, the research adopts a qualitative approach, grounded in the application of online questionnaires and the conduction of semi-structured interviews with young members of the ARMY fandom in Aracaju. Data analysis reveals that engagement with BTS functions as a gateway to contact with and the incorporation of Asian cultural habits, fostering processes of identification, belonging, and the resignification of everyday practices. It is observed that such consumption practices operate across both digital environments and face-to-face experiences, contributing to the symbolic territorialization of the fandom within the urban space of Aracaju. The study concludes that the BTS fandom functions as an important cultural mediator, in which the consumption of Asian cultural habits plays a central role in the production of meaning and in the consolidation of contemporary youth identities.