1st Edition
Media Narratives and the COVID-19 Pandemic The Asian Experience
This volume investigates mediated lives and media narratives during the Covid-19 pandemic, with Asia as a focus point. It shows how the pandemic has created an unprecedented situation in this globalized world marked by many disruptions in the social, economic, political, and cultural lives of individuals and communities— creating a ‘new normal’. It explores the different media vocabularies of fear, panic, social distancing, and contagion from across Asian nations. It focuses on the role media played as most nations faced lockdowns and unique challenges during the crisis. From healthcare workers to sex workers, from racism to nationalism, from the plight of migrant workers in news reporting to state propaganda, this book brings critical questions confronting media professionals into focus.
The volume is of critical interest to scholars and researchers of media and communication studies, politics, especially political communication, social and public policy, and Asian studies.
Introduction
Shubhda Arora & Keval J. Kumar
I. Missing and Marginalized Narratives
1. Unrest in the Comments: Voicing the Discontent of Japan’s Foreign Residents in the Comments Sections of Japan Today
Christopher J. Hayes
2. Gender, Media and the COVID-19 Pandemic: An Investigation into Missing Gendered Narratives in Indian News Media
Shipra Raj
3. The Mask Dilemma: Hierarchy between Two Know-Hows in Chinese-Language Media of Canada
Grace Cheng-Ying Lin
4. Missing Media Narratives: COVID’s Impact on Transgender Population in India
Shubhda Chaudhary
II. Media Memory and Narratives
5. Masked Presence: COVID-19 and Remembering SARS in Taiwan
Jacob F. Tischer
6. Familial Halcyon: Narratives of Nostalgia in the Lockdown
Azania Imtiaz Patel
III. Media Bias and Propaganda
7. Taiwan Can Help: COVID-19, The Model Minority State and the Limits of Taiwan-as-Beacon Rhetoric
Jamin D. Shih
8. The Myths of Hate: Digital Deception in the (Communal) times of COVID-19
Saesha Kini & G Gyanesh
9. Risk Communication versus Risks in Communication: Efforts of Vietnam Government in Controlling Messages during COVID-19 Pandemic
Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen & Nguyen Thanh Mai
10. Modern Hua Mulans in Global Chinese-Speaking Media: Female Frontline Workers as Tools of Propaganda During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Ashley Liu and Shuyue Yang
IV. Mainstream and Alternative Narratives
11. Confronting Anti-Asian Bias in the Classroom: Reflections on the Importance of Asian and Asian American Studies in the Wake of COVID-19
Meghan Cai & Kimberly McKee
12. From A Story of Disaster to A Story of Victory: Chinese Media Reports in the COVID-19 Crisis
Runya Qiaoan & Beatrice Gallelli
13. The COVID-19 Pandemic: News Reporting in Malaysia
Normahfuzah Ahmad, Awan Ismail & Norsiah Abdul Hamid
V. Narratives of Othering
14. Viral Vilification
Gita V. Pai
15. Pandemics, Politics and Religious ‘Others’: Exploring Media Narratives during COVID-19 in India and Pakistan
Laraib Niaz
VI. Social Media Narratives
16. Social Media and Vietnamese Undocumented Workers in Thailand During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Anthony Le Duc
17. Representations of COVID-19 in West Asia: A Case study of Islamic Republic News Agency’s (IRNA) Instagram account
Hamideh Molaei & Maziar Mozaffari Falarti
18. Don’t Panic! Reach Us: Indian Tech Unions’ Social Media Narratives during the Pandemic
Rianka Roy
Biography
Shubhda Arora is an Assistant Professor of Communication at the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, India. She is a media sociologist with research interests in Gender, Environmental and Disaster Communication. She has authored research papers and book chapters exploring ideas of Vulnerability and Social Inequality.
Keval J. Kumar is an Adjunct Professor at MICA, India. Earlier, he was a Reader at Pune University and Director of SIMC. He is the author of Mass Communication in India (5th Edition), Media Education, Communication and Public Policy, and has contributed to the International Encyclopaedia of Media Literacy and The Handbook of Media Education Research.
