The Pandemic in Our Country, the Pandemic in Their Countries: News Values and Media Representation of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The article investigates how the COVID-19 pandemic around the world is represented by the New York Times (NYT) and China Daily (CD), newspapers from two countries with long-standing political tension. The data consists of 2572 reports that are classified into three groups: reports on COVID-19 in the US, reports on COVID-19 in China, and reports on COVID-19 in other countries/regions. The reports are analyzed in terms of their discursive news values. Analysis results show that NYT represents the pandemic in the US, and CD represents the pandemic in China as the least negative, the least impactful and with the most personal accounts. NYT represents the pandemic in China, and CD represents the pandemic in the US as the most negative, the most impactful, the most severe, and the least positive and proximate. The selection and representation of other countries/regions reflect a differentiated coverage of the “Others” by both NYT and CD. The study lends support to a previous hypothesis that domestic crises tend to be presented as less negative than those in other countries, and invites contemplation on the influence of nationalism and political antagonism on the news media in times of global health crises.

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