Na Jae-min, known professionally by the mononymJaemin, is a South Korean singer, rapper, songwriter and actor based in Seoul, South Korea. He is a member of the South Korean boy group NCT and its sub-unit NCT Dream.
Early life
Jaemin was born in Jeonju, South Korea on August 13, 2000. He grew up in Seoul and studied at Incheon Cheong-il Elementary School; he also attended at Incheon Haewon Middle School and went to School of Performing Arts Seoul. Jaemin became a trainee under SM Entertainment in 2013 after being street-casted by staff while handing out posters and collecting trash as a volunteer with his mom at an event.
Jaemin made his first appearance on broadcast on , a reality TV Show which starred fellow labelmate EXO, alongside other trainees. The show featured performances of songs of prominent 90s K-pop idols, as well as the recreation of music videos of songs from the era. He featured in several events, including SM Town Live World Tour IV, before being formally introduced as a member of predebut training team, SM Rookies, on April 22, 2015. In 2015, Jaemin appeared on Disney Channel Korea's The Mickey Mouse Club as a Mouseketeer alongside other members of the SM Rookies program. The show aired from July 23 to December 17, 2015 and was hosted by Leeteuk of Super Junior.
2016–present: NCT and solo endeavours
On August 25, 2016, Jaemin was announced as a member of NCT and its third sub-unit, NCT Dream, alongside Mark, Renjun, Jeno, Haechan, Chenle and Jisung. The group consisted of the then under-19 members of NCT, and made their official debut on August 24, 2016 with the single "Chewing Gum". On February 2, 2017, prior to the group's second release "My First", it was announced that Jaemin had been placed on hiatus to recover from a long-standing herniated disc. This hiatus continued for the rest of the year. Jaemin made his return as part of NCT 2018, a special project involving all 18 members of NCT. On March 4, 2018, he made his comeback with NCT Dream with the single "Go", which was promoted as part of NCT's first album, NCT 2018 Empathy. This marked his first comeback since the unit's debut. He also took part in the NCT 2018 single "Black on Black" off the same album, which released April 18 that same year. Later that year, Jaemin joined the cast for the second season of tvN's "My English Teen 100 Hours", an educational variety show in which cast members studied English intensively for 7 hours each day over a period of 2 weeks. The cast was then sent abroad to test their application of English in real life. The variety show began airing May 20. Jaemin participated in the lyric-writing of track "Dear Dream" off of NCT Dream's second EP We Go Up. The album released on September 3, 2018. He has also written lyrics for several tracks on NCT Dream's subsequent albums. On March 13, 2019, Jaemin, alongside fellow NCT Dream members Jeno and Jisung, represented K-pop stars at the "K-Wave & Halal Show" in Malaysia. The friendship event between South Korea and Malaysia, was attended by President Moon as part of his three-day state visit to the country. In April that year, Jaemin made his acting debut as the main character for JTBC short web-drama "Method to Hate You", based on a popular webtoon of the same name. Jaemin appeared on the gaming variety show Do You Want To Play? GG, where celebrities formed a team to play against high school students in a variety of games. The show began airing in May 2019.
Philanthropy
In November 2018, Jaemin joined UNICEF Korea Special Representative Siwon Choi in Vietnam for UNICEF's World Children’s Day celebration campaign against school violence. In March 2019, Jaemin attended UNICEF Korea committee's event "For Every Child" as a youth representative, meeting with Queen Mathilde of Belgium and former President of International Criminal CourtSong Sang-hyun. In May the same year, Jaemin, along with fellow NCT Dream member Jeno, visited children living in slums in Indonesia with South Korea-based non-governmental organization, Good Neighbors.
