I'm currently watching a drama and they use the term "입덕". My understanding is that it's a neologistic colloquial term meaning "to become a fan (of someone)".
In this drama (From Now On, Showtime! / 지금부터, 쇼타임!), the characters say the male lead is in the 입덕 stage of falling for the female lead. Specifically, they elaborate and make a point to say that 입덕 means that he's in the denial stage of being in love with her (there's a character transplanted into modern times from 2000 years ago so they genuinely do define and explain the slang term he isn't familiar with).
This is at odds with what I knew of the term though. Semantically, is there an element of denial when someone says they've become a fan of someone / -에 입덕하다? Is it an implicit meaning of the term?
No. There is no inherently implicit connotation of denial stage with regards to 입덕. However, it's a combination of memes
(1) 입덕 itself is a meme word
おたく (오타쿠) → memified spelling 오덕후 → abbreviation 덕후 → further abbreviation 덕
들 입 入 (enter) + 오타구(おたく) = 입덕 (to enter into otaku stage of stanning for someone/something)
(2) Second meme is the sort of a varaiation of a five stages of emotion especially when facing something that's considered negative.
These five stages are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
So otaku carrying a relatively negative (although it can be minor) social notion, someone who newly becomes a fan of someone/something (i.e. 입덕) can go through those stages beginning with denial. Among Korean memes is something called 입덕부정기 (the denial stage of new becoming a fan)
So, these are layers of multiple meme-level wordplays that are generally used among young female subculture fans (and relatively unknown memes to older native speakers). But there is no inherent meaning of denialism codified or connoted in the word 입덕 itself.
Thank you so much for this detailed explanation! It makes a world of sense.
Your understanding of 입덕 (Ip-deok) is 100% correct literally—it’s just a neologism for "entering fandom" or becoming a fan. However, the drama is referencing a very specific stage of that process called 입덕부정기 (Ip-deok-bu-jeong-gi), which translates to the "Fan-Entrance Denial Period." In Korean fan culture, there’s this running joke that no one wants to become a hardcore "stan" because it’s a massive sink for your time, money, and emotions. So, when you start catching feelings for a celebrity, you naturally go through a stage of: "No, I'm just curious," or "I don't actually like them that much." By the time you actually admit you've "entered the fandom" (입덕), the denial is usually over. The drama is just using that "fandom" slang as a metaphor for the male lead's romantic feelings—he’s clearly obsessed but still trying to convince himself he isn't. So while "denial" isn't the dictionary definition of 입덕, it’s definitely the emotional subtext of the process!