Visual ethnography with 360° camera applied to the K-pop phenomenon in Mexico City: public space, heterotopias and ethics of responsibility

Espacio público, heterotopías y ética de la responsabilidad

Resumo

Visual ethnography in this research is a situated, embodied, and relational methodological approach that enables the production of knowledge from the interaction between bodies, images, technologies, and urban spaces. Its use does not respond to a purely documentary intent, nor to the mere accumulation of audiovisual records, but rather to the need to understand how youth K-pop practices produce meaning, identity, and territoriality in the public space of Mexico City. Based on this, a 360° camera (Insta360 X3) is used as a fundamental element of the video ethnography employed to explain this social phenomenon in greater depth, since beyond guaranteeing neutrality, it is a device that destabilizes the single framing, records the co-presence of the event, and demands a reflexive interpretation of the researcher’s position. This research addresses the different meanings produced by young people who dance K-pop in the urban space of Mexico City, identifying the different youth dynamics and belonging to the social group. Based on the link between phenomenology and visual methods, the article presents the results of a research project whose main objective was to analyze the dancing of different youth groups related to K-pop at the Monument to the Revolution, over a period from 2023 to 2025, in order to analyze the meanings they give to their personal and group identity, as well as their appropriation of public space and the production of heterotopias. The research is based on a theoretical review of the fundamental concepts used to analyze this phenomenon, such as the embodied phenomenology approach, which is formed from situated observation in the territory, allowing for the analysis of performative dynamics from a position of ethical responsibility. The visual methods used consisted of video ethnography using a 360° camera, analyzing four framing aspects: 1) public building windows as mirrors, 2) the Monument to the Revolution and the public roadway, 3) K-pop choreographies, and 4) images of the researcher during ethnographic fieldwork with the 360° camera. Among the main findings is that through K-pop, youth heterotopias are produced in which historical memory, global culture, and sensory experience are re-signified in ephemeral, contingent, but highly significant events, providing a metadisciplinary understanding of the interrelationship between public space, embodied visual ethnography, young people’s group life, and the responsible participation of researchers.