Identity, nationalism and orientalism: media representation of football player Wu Lei in China and Spain

Abstract

Football has developed to different degrees in Europe and Asia. Wu Lei, who played for Reial Club Deportiu Espanyol, was the only Chinese footballer in the top five European football leagues from 2019 to 2022. Applying critical discourse analysis, this study examines how Chinese and Spanish news reports have constructed Wu Lei’s identity and represented the political and economic forces that supported Wu Lei in becoming the only Chinese player in La Liga in Spain. The research reveals the same subject was constructed by nationalism in China and Orientalism in Spain. Chinese nationalism is reproduced through the semi-colonial memory of an underdeveloped China and articulated in tandem with neoliberalism. Facing aggressive investments from Chinese private capital, Spanish media reproduced Orientalism by constructing the image of China as an economic hegemon and site of political otherness.

Keywords:

• Critical discourse analysis
• Wu Lei
• football
• orientalism
• Chinese nationalism

Notes

1 The four fan-owned clubs are Athletic Club, FC Barcelona, Real Madrid and Osasuna.

2 The ‘Big Five’ represent the five most successful football leagues in Europe: the Premier League in England, La Liga in Spain, the Bundesliga in Germany, Serie A in Italy, and Ligue 1 in France.

3 Chinese residents in Spain were recorded at 197,188 in 2020. https://es.statista.com/estadisticas/472512/poblacion-extranjera-de-espana-por-nacionalidad/.

4 In China commercialized media need to satisfy investors and make a profit, in addition to complying with political orders. We distinguish party media from commercialized media in China on the basis of Stockmann (2013) and Repnikova and Fang (2018).

5 The selected newspapers comprise four of five most-read newspapers in Spain. https://reporting.aimc.es/index.html#/main/diarios.

6 Dong Fangzhuo played for Royal Antwerp FC in 2005 and 2006.

7 ‘985 universities’ includes the top-ranking universities in China. Lanxiang is an institution devoted to adult professional education.

8 Qianjiang Evening News is subordinate to the Zhejiang Daily Press Group, a commercialized media organization in the Zhejiang province of China.

9 In recent years, far-right parties have adopted ideologies that might be characterized as populist, nationalist, and anti-immigrant. They have gained a great number of followers in Spain and many Western countries. The centre-right remain moderate in Spain.