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Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK

Yan Wu Orcid Logo, Matthew Wall Orcid Logo, Jun Yang Orcid Logo, Xin Zhao Orcid Logo

Journal of Language and Discrimination, Volume: 10, Issue: 1, Pages: 51 - 76

Swansea University Authors: Yan Wu Orcid Logo, Matthew Wall Orcid Logo, Jun Yang Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.3138/jld-2024-0016

Abstract

Public health crises caused by infectious diseases have long been racially charged in Western countries, frequently functioning as vectors for the stigmatisation and othering of ethnic minorities. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a surge of Sinophobic sentiment and violence against Chinese and East and...

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Published in: Journal of Language and Discrimination
ISSN: 2397-2637 eISSN 2397-2645
Published: Toronto University of Toronto Press
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa71873
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spelling v2 71873 2026-05-08 Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK fcb0b08dd7afa00f6899a02d4cb66fff 0000-0002-5741-6862 Yan Wu Yan Wu true false 22914658d586a5759d4d4b945ea140bd 0000-0001-8265-4910 Matthew Wall Matthew Wall true false 97bd77e98c19f4447cbacbebe2b8f108 0000-0002-0004-0956 Jun Yang Jun Yang true false 2026-05-08 CACS Public health crises caused by infectious diseases have long been racially charged in Western countries, frequently functioning as vectors for the stigmatisation and othering of ethnic minorities. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a surge of Sinophobic sentiment and violence against Chinese and East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) communities brought renewed attention to these dynamics. Although communication scholarship has examined overtly racialised news framings in the United States, the United Kingdom remains comparatively underexplored. This is because British political and mainstream media discourse appeared to reject explicit racialisation of the virus at large. In this paper, we argue that a subtle yet consequential form of cultural racism is detected in press coverage and is responsible for the reproduction of “othering” logics, negative evaluations, and elite level scapegoating of minority communities for public health mismanagement. Employing corpus-assisted critical discourse analysis, this study examines UK press coverage of Chinese and ESEA communities across 14 newspapers and online outlets. The time frame for the study was from 29 January 2020, when the first two COVID-19 cases were reported in the United Kingdom, to 21 February 2022, when all COVID-19 restrictions were lifted. The findings demonstrate that medical scapegoating operates in the UK media context through subtle narrative strategies. Our study advances scholarly understanding of racism in media representation by proposing a new concept of public health crisis racism, which shapes media narratives and functions to construct a positive self-image for the majority population and to unite social groups against ethnic minorities as “others.” Journal Article Journal of Language and Discrimination 10 1 51 76 University of Toronto Press Toronto 2397-2637 eISSN 2397-2645 Chinese, COVID-19, East and Southeast Asian, health crisis racism, media representation, medical scapegoating 0 0 0 0001-01-01 10.3138/jld-2024-0016 COLLEGE NANME Culture and Communications School COLLEGE CODE CACS Swansea University Other 2026-05-08T15:27:34.8125084 2026-05-08T15:05:01.1096830 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR Yan Wu 0000-0002-5741-6862 1 Matthew Wall 0000-0001-8265-4910 2 Jun Yang 0000-0002-0004-0956 3 Xin Zhao 0000-0001-6853-7224 4
title Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
spellingShingle Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
Yan Wu
Matthew Wall
Jun Yang
title_short Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
title_full Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
title_fullStr Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
title_full_unstemmed Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
title_sort Health Crisis Racism and Medical Scapegoating: Media Representation of Chinese and Asian Ethnicity During COVID-19 in the UK
author_id_str_mv fcb0b08dd7afa00f6899a02d4cb66fff
22914658d586a5759d4d4b945ea140bd
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author_id_fullname_str_mv fcb0b08dd7afa00f6899a02d4cb66fff_***_Yan Wu
22914658d586a5759d4d4b945ea140bd_***_Matthew Wall
97bd77e98c19f4447cbacbebe2b8f108_***_Jun Yang
author Yan Wu
Matthew Wall
Jun Yang
author2 Yan Wu
Matthew Wall
Jun Yang
Xin Zhao
format Journal article
container_title Journal of Language and Discrimination
container_volume 10
container_issue 1
container_start_page 51
institution Swansea University
issn 2397-2637
eISSN 2397-2645
doi_str_mv 10.3138/jld-2024-0016
publisher University of Toronto Press
college_str Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofhumanitiesandsocialsciences
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofhumanitiesandsocialsciences
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
department_str School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR
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description Public health crises caused by infectious diseases have long been racially charged in Western countries, frequently functioning as vectors for the stigmatisation and othering of ethnic minorities. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a surge of Sinophobic sentiment and violence against Chinese and East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) communities brought renewed attention to these dynamics. Although communication scholarship has examined overtly racialised news framings in the United States, the United Kingdom remains comparatively underexplored. This is because British political and mainstream media discourse appeared to reject explicit racialisation of the virus at large. In this paper, we argue that a subtle yet consequential form of cultural racism is detected in press coverage and is responsible for the reproduction of “othering” logics, negative evaluations, and elite level scapegoating of minority communities for public health mismanagement. Employing corpus-assisted critical discourse analysis, this study examines UK press coverage of Chinese and ESEA communities across 14 newspapers and online outlets. The time frame for the study was from 29 January 2020, when the first two COVID-19 cases were reported in the United Kingdom, to 21 February 2022, when all COVID-19 restrictions were lifted. The findings demonstrate that medical scapegoating operates in the UK media context through subtle narrative strategies. Our study advances scholarly understanding of racism in media representation by proposing a new concept of public health crisis racism, which shapes media narratives and functions to construct a positive self-image for the majority population and to unite social groups against ethnic minorities as “others.”
published_date 0001-01-01T15:27:36Z
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