Abstract
Italy was one of the first European countries affected by the Covid-19 pandemic after the beginning of the outbreak in China in January 2020. Applying critical discourse analysis and theories of the mediation of suffering, this article explores the discursive strategies used by the Italian media to represent China and Chinese people in relation to the outbreak in the early stage of the pandemic. Employing the theoretical frameworks of Mary Douglas, Michel Foucault, and other thinkers on biopolitics, racism, and emergency, the results bring to light the persistent ideologies behind the media representations of an imagined Other, which reflect existing discourses toward the Chinese community in Italy. In this study, the contentious discourses around China and the Chinese amidst the pandemic reveal the role of the Italian media in presenting risks, mediating suffering as a distant event and, later, as a national concern.
Highlights
Was one of the first European countries affected by the Covid-19 pandemic after the beginning of the outbreak in China in January 2020
We aim to answer several research questions: (1) What are the discursive constructions of China and the Chinese in the Italian news media from January to March 2020? (2) How do they relate to the pre-existing attitude toward the Chinese community in Italy? (3) What is the significance of these discourses and the national policy in response to the emerging pandemic? We respond to these questions through a combination of critical discourses analysis and grounded theory, followed by a critical interpretation of the results contextualized by the Italian socio-political structures
Our analysis shows how, during the early stage of the pandemic, Italian media narratives were dominated by pervasive racial stereotypes, which are part of the long-lasting imagery of China fueled by discourses along the lines of those conceptualized in Douglas (1966)’s work and the yellow peril ideology
Summary
Was one of the first European countries affected by the Covid-19 pandemic after the beginning of the outbreak in China in January 2020. Applying critical discourse analysis and theories of the mediation of suffering, this article explores the discursive strategies used by the Italian media to represent China and Chinese people in relation to the outbreak in the early stage of the pandemic. The popular perceptions of the Chinese in Italy are often negative since they represent competition (Verdini, 2011) from the economic perspective They are seen to be threatening the economic sustainability of the country, largely because of the labor flexibility of the Chinese workshop: long working hours, low salaries, and the employment of illegal migrants (Ceccagno, 2007). Academic research of the Chinese in Italy rarely addresses these media discourses
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