Constructing and framing violent protests in news translation: a narrative analysis of the 2019 Hong Kong protests

This paper analyzes how the 2019 Hong Kong protests are constructed and framed in news translation. The translated news articles published by BBC Chinese, NYT Chinese, and XNA Chinese, as well as the original English articles, have been selected for analysis. An interdisciplinary approach is developed, which integrates narrative theory from translation studies with the concept of the protest paradigm from communication studies. The analysis reveals that news translation in the context of protests promotes the ideology of the source culture to target readers. The three news organizations differ in the use of framing strategies, with ideology being weakened, reproduced, or reinforced in the translation process. The findings shed light on how multilingual media can improve the coverage and translation of protest news to help recognize protests as a legitimate form of democratic expression.