Mistranslation as disinformation: COVID-19, global imaginaries, and self-serving cosmopolitanism

ABSTRACT

This article delves into the politics of the U.S.-China blame-game regarding COVID-19’s origin, particularly Chinese disinformation narratives attributing the virus’s root to the United States. The blame-game is symptomatic of contradictory global imaginaries circulated within distinct geopolitical spaces. This article approaches Chinese disinformation narratives as transnational and intertextual constructs, which involve the practices of (mis)translating and referencing foreign source texts to paradoxically delegitimate the foreign, especially Western, Other; they reinforce what I call self-serving cosmopolitanism, a narcissistic and locally conditioned sense of global consciousness that is oriented towards the consolidation of self-identity and pride. It is my contention that, to combat global disinformation about COVID-19, we should foreground the politics of translation, enhance cross-cultural sensibility, and most importantly, mobilize a kind of counter-politics against the xenophobic nationalism that disinformation narratives often parasitize. Cultural scholars with comparative perspectives are well positioned to take the initiative in revealing the structural issues at play within a global context and in promoting genuine cosmopolitan openness.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• disinformation
• China-U.S. relations
• politics of translation
• cosmopolitanism
• nationalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Further information

This Special Issue article has been comprehensively reviewed by the Special Issue editors, Associate Professor Ted Striphas and Professor John Nguyet Erni.

Notes

1 Although ‘misinformation’ and ‘disinformation’ are variously defined, I follow the definition of misinformation as inadvertent sharing of false information, and disinformation as deliberate creation and sharing of false information (Bakir and McStay 2018).

2 The Global Times story was reprinted by The People’s Daily Online.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sheng Zou

Sheng Zou is a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan's International Institute. He received his Ph.D. in Communication from Stanford University. His research interests include global media industries, digital media and society, platform economy and labor, and digital journalism. His current work explores the intersection of governance, politics, and popular culture in digital China, particularly state-society interactions through new media platforms.