Some of the lyrics in Oh My Girl YooA's "Bon Voyage" have been plagiarized by a high school student, and the essay containing the lyrics was declared a winning piece.
According to an exclusive report of Yeongdam Daily, one of the winning essays in the "Dalgubul Essay Contest" organized by the Daegu Culture Association has been considered invalid due to plagiarism. An official from the said association pointed out that the work chosen at the competition held last year contains content similar to the lyrics of a solo track by a K-pop artist.
What made this look worse is that the winning essay suspected of plagiarism was published in the "Collection of Works of the Dalgubul Essay Contest" book without proper authentication.
Written by a high school student, the work goes with the title "Girl of the Forest," which is quite the same as the title of the K-pop song, which turned out to be Oh My Girl YooA's "Bon Voyage" or "Child of the Forest."
On top of that, it has been revealed that 40% of the essay's content matched the lyrics of YooA's solo track. Without knowing about this, the work of the high school student was pronounced the winner in the poetry category.
Comments about the Plagiarism Discovered in the Winning Essay
In response to the issue, poet Sa Yoon Soo said, "I heard that the award was returned after the collection book was published. If someone had not brought up any issue with the winning essay, then the plagiarized work would have remained among the notable pieces."
The contest organizer also gave a comment about the matter and stated that they will pay closer attention to verifying submitted works and also emphasized that any winning essay suspected of plagiarism will automatically lose its place. It is said that the high school student in question has already returned the prize money.
The Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism has also addressed the plagiarism issue and stated that they will conduct a survey on the present-day status of the country's literature awards.
This is not the first time that a work by another individual was plagiarized just to win in a writing competition. Kim Min Jung, who wrote a short story titled "Root" in 2018 and earned the "White Horse Culture Award," is taking legal action against Mr. Song, who was declared a winner in five contests last year by copying her work without her permission.
Oh My Girl YooA's "Bon Voyage"
"Bon Voyage" is an extended play of Oh My Girl's YooA that was released for her solo debut in September 2020. It contains five songs including the title track that has the same name as the EP. Penned by Seo Ji Eum, the single arouses feelings of being one with Mother Earth and retains a magical aura throughout.
Oh My Girl's YooA entered the Gaon Albums Chart with her solo mini-album, peaking at No. 3. She also received her very first music show trophy with her solo track in SBS's "The Show."
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Written by Mhaliya Scott
