Counter-Frames Against Anti-Asian Racism During the Corona Pandemic in Berlin – Coping With Exclusion, Creating Belonging and Organising Resistance

Abstract

In 2020, anti-Asian racism re-emerged during the coronavirus pandemic in Germany and elsewhere, manifesting in media narratives, and evoking different forms of violence and exclusion, especially in public space. Racialisation as an everyday process creates “counter-frames” by racialised groups. They are constructed in relation to institutionalised interpellation as “the other.” Building on Feagin's concept of “white framing” and “counter-framing” and Löw's concept of space, this paper discusses the effects of racialisation, coping and anti-racist resistance strategies as developed by the Asian diaspora. Social change regarding racism will be analysed through Foroutan's concept of “postmigrant society.” We based this study on a convenience sample of people with Asian heritage which we conducted in 2020 in Germany. In addition, we included a diary study for which a subset has been sampled. We argue that the pandemic influenced the formation of counter-frames against anti-Asian racism in the specific context of Berlin.

Ethnic-Racial Socialization Through the Lens of German Young Adults of Turkish, Kurdish, East and Southeast Asian Heritage

“…In addition, people of Asian heritage in Germany have been subject to global stereotypes and racialization (e.g., model minority, perpetual foreigner, feminization of Asian men, and fetishization of Asian women, being called "exotic" or "boat people") (Suda et al, 2020). Recently, greater anti-Asian sentiments and harassment emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic (Suda & Köhler, 2023).…”

“…We address the research question by interviewing young adults who were born between 1989 and 2003 regarding the retrospective reflection of their life experiences of growing up in Germany. The interviews were conducted in 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic which heightened anti-Asian racism (Scholaske, 2022;Suda & Köhler, 2023) and a year after a right-wing extremist shooting at a shisha bar in Hanau on February 19 th , 2020 killing nine people of Kurdish, Turkish, Roma and Sinti, Afghan, Bosnian, and Bulgarian origins (Windel et al, 2023).…”