Unravelling Discourses on COVID-19, South Asians and Punjabi Canadians

Abstract

This article uses critical discourse analysis to examine how the higher -COVID-19 infection rates among South Asians in general, and Punjabis more -specifically, have been represented by conservative politicians and their -representatives as a consequence of cultural and religious practices. Two counternarratives are discussed. The first substitutes the negative image of the Sikh Punjabi -Canadian community with a celebratory and positive view of Sikh humanitarianism -and community service. The second attributes the high numbers to class attributes-such as precarious jobs, poverty-level wages, employment insecurity, lack of sick -days, over-crowded housing, racism and lack of access to healthcare. We argue that -the conservative explanation as well as the first counter-narrative reveal continuities -in culturalist understandings of South Asian immigrants, albeit in slightly different -ways. The second counter-narrative represents a discursive resistance by advancing a -structural analysis of health and disease in immigrant communities