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Article published In: Journal of Language Aggression and Conflict
Vol. 13:2 (2025) ► pp.276–301

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Examining the discursive construction of Chinese grassroots cybernationalism

A case study on the permanent residence law for foreigners

ORCiD logo with link | Lingnan University | Panteion University of Social & Political Sciences
ORCiD logo with link | Panteion University of Social & Political Sciences
Published online: 16 April 2024
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlac.00103.gu
Abstract
Recent years have seen a surge in Chinese grassroots nationalism. Based on the public discussion on Weibo, the largest social media platform in China, this study investigated the cybernationalism (re)produced during the People’s Republic of China’s release of the Regulations on the Administration of Permanent Residence of Foreigners in early 2020. Deploying a synergy of thematic analysis and the discourse-historical approach (Reisigl, Martin, and Ruth Wodak. 2005. Discourse and Discrimination: Rhetorics of Racism and Antisemitism. London, New York: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar, . 2016. “The Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA).” In Methods of Critical Discourse Studies, ed. by Ruth Wodak, and Martin Reisigl, 23–61. London: Sage.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar), especially its argumentative perspectives, it examined the articulation of bottom-up cybernationalism and how this nationalism, boosted by the party-state, turns against the party-state when it fails to uphold its own nationalistic rhetorics, thereby influencing the government’s immigration policymaking. The results revealed that the discursive construction of a dichotomy between “derogatory foreigners” and “dignified Chinese” prevents the implementation of the regulation; the foregrounded anti-Black sentiment reflects a (re)appreciation of the global hierarchy of race in China based on orientalistic views; the discursive representations of humiliated history vitally motivates nationalism.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Introducing regulations on permanent residence in China
  • 3.Nationalism in the digital form
  • 4.Methods
    • 4.1Data collection
    • 4.2Methodological frames
  • 5.Results
    • 5.1Representing foreignness: Exteriorisation, denigration and somatisation
      • 5.1.1Emphasising “exteriority”
      • 5.1.2Denigrating metaphors
      • 5.1.3Somatisation
    • 5.2Representing Chineseness: Self-favouritism and self-derogation
      • 5.2.1Self-favouritism
      • 5.2.2Self-derogation
  • 6.Discussion and conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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