G-DRAGON Becomes the First K-Pop Artist to Have a 4-Credit Course in the U.S.

G-DRAGON (hereafter G-DRAGON) has become the first K-Pop artist to have a 4-credit course in the United States. This is the first time a 4-credit course has been offered solely on a K-Pop artist at the University of Southern California (USC) Annenberg, which is ranked among the top communication schools globally.

The announcement of this course was first made through USC Annenberg's official Instagram account. The feed featured a video of a USC student expressing excitement about the course, along with the hashtags ‘#GDRAGON’ and ‘#GD’, and at the end of the video, G-DRAGON's official account was tagged, creating a significant buzz. Similar to the Beyoncé course at Yale and the Taylor Swift course at Harvard, the establishment of the G-DRAGON course at USC is seen as an official recognition by academia of the industrial and cultural value of K-Pop as a global cultural phenomenon and the 'G-DRAGON worldview'. In particular, his unique influence and trend-making ability suggest that he is a crucial driving force in elevating the status of K-Pop and creating new value.

The course titled 'COMM 400: Crooked Studies of K-Pop: The Case of G-DRAGON' will be offered in the spring semester of 2026 and will be taught by Professor Hye Jin Lee. This course aims to present a new discourse on K-Pop by conducting an in-depth analysis of G-DRAGON, who is considered the most influential and innovative figure in K-Pop history, in a context where K-Pop is still discussed within frames of mechanical, commercial, and artistic autonomy despite its global success. It will particularly focus on G-DRAGON's unique status as a 'producer idol' and his cultural influence beyond music. Based on this, it will critically reinterpret the structural, cultural, and aesthetic assumptions of K-Pop.