BTS, South Korea’s internationally renowned boy band, is not submitting an entry to the 2027 Grammy Awards.
The announcement was made just one month after the Recording Academy, the organization behind the Grammys, introduced five new categories – Best Asian Pop Music Performance, Best R&B Collaboration or Duo/Group Performance, Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance, Best Traditional Folk Album, and Best Latin Song.
The Recording Academy is composed of performers, songwriters, executives, producers, musicians, engineers and music educators, among other industry players.
The Best Asian Pop Music Performance, in particular, was introduced to recognize the continued growth of Asian pop music, which includes Korean pop, Japanese pop, and Mandarin pop. The Grammys describes the category as a recognition of “artistic excellence in Asian pop music performances originating from widely recognized Asian markets, with meaningful use of one or more Asian languages.”
Here’s what BTS posted in its members’ individual Instagram accounts: “We have decided not to enter the Grammys this year. We hope that music can be heard and loved for what it is, rather than being divided by region or language. We thank Army and everyone who has always stood by us.”
The announcement, written originally in Korean, read more like a gentle rebuke to the Grammys rather than a simple update.
What’s the issue?
The Grammys have long been accused of racial bias. In 2017, Canadian musician Drake said the Grammys pigeonholes him as a rapper because he is black. He won Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song for “Hotline Bling” in the 59th Grammy Awards despite his claim that his biggest hits were pop songs.
In a 2017 interview with British host DJ Semtex, Drake said: “The only category that they can manage to fit me in is in a rap category, maybe because I’ve rapped in the past or because I’m black.”
The Grammys were also criticized when British singer Adele’s “25” won Album of the Year against Beyoncé’s “Lemonade.” Rolling Stone reporter Steve Knopper argued that Beyoncé lost because Grammy voters were generally white males.
Hispanic and Latino American musicians are also underrepresented and are usually shifted to categories of the Latin Grammy Awards.
Under the 2027 Grammy rules, a song can only compete in one category, and entering the new Best Asian Pop Music category would shut BTS out from competing under the Best Pop/Duo race, where it has been nominated before.
BTS has been nominated for a Grammy five times but has never won. Its decision to skip the awards is being widely supported by fans and industry watchers.
Fans lament that the Grammys only nominate and invite BTS to perform as bait for ratings. The sentiment echoes Eminem’s sentiment of using hip-hop artists as a selling point to boost ratings while repeatedly snubbing them for major categories.
For one, viewers of the 2025 Grammy Awards averaged 15.4 million — a 12% drop from the previous year. BTS maknae (youngest member) Jungkook drew 6 million fans who watched him sleep on WeVerse for 45 minutes, underscoring the group’s unmatched global pull.
Mainstream, not margins
Although the introduction of a Best Asian Pop Music Performance category appears progressive, BTS’ refusal to participate highlights the risk of reinforcing “otherness” rather than placing Asian artistry at the center and within the mainstream.
According to cultural theorist Stuart Hall, representation is never neutral and is shaped by ideology, power, and social positioning, which often position marginalized groups as peripheral rather than central.
The Grammys’ move to box Asian artists in a niche rather than allowing them to compete equally in global categories underscores this concern. In their Instagram posts, deliberately written in Korean, the BTS members pointed out that music should be heard and loved for what it is, regardless of language or region.
The issue is also more than being nominated or receiving awards but about cultural legitimacy. Asian pop music has already proven its global reach, impactfully shaping fashion, literature, fandom, and digital culture worldwide.
Korean pop’s transnational appeal has posed serious challenges to Western dominance in the global pop culture stage, yet institutional frameworks like the Grammys often lag behind, or even refuse to recognize Asian music only when it can be neatly boxed as “Asian.”
This echoes broader patterns of racialization in the music industry. As Black Studies scholar and professor George Lipsitz argued, cultural institutions often construct racial hierarchies to define what counts as “universal” versus what is “ethnic.”
By creating a separate category and labeling it as Asian, the Grammys is implicitly suggesting that Asian pop cannot compete on equal footing with Western pop, even though BTS has consistently topped global charts and sold out stadiums worldwide.
The discourse around BTS and the Grammys becomes part of a larger conversation and movement to decolonize cultural recognition that insists Asian voices belong at the center.
It forces musical institutions like the Grammys to confront a critical question: Will they continue to create separate spaces for Asian artists, or will they finally acknowledge that Asian music is already part of the global mainstream? CS
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