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. 2023 Dec;3(3):100059.
doi: 10.1016/j.acorp.2023.100059. Epub 2023 Jun 12.

Who works on the 'frontline'? comparing constructions of 'frontline' work before and during the COVID-19 pandemic

Dr Kathryn Spicksley  1 , Dr Emma Franklin  2
Affiliations

Who works on the 'frontline'? comparing constructions of 'frontline' work before and during the COVID-19 pandemic

Dr Kathryn Spicksley et al. Appl Corpus Linguistics. 2023 Dec.

Abstract

This article provides a comparative analysis of how frontline workers were constructed by the UK media prior to and during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. Both the News on the Web Corpus and the Coronavirus Corpus, as monitor corpora of web-based new articles, were utilised to identify changes in both the frequency and use of the word front*line from 2010 to 2021. Findings show that, following the outbreak of COVID-19, constructions of frontline work were more frequently associated with medical professions and became more figurative in nature. Our findings provide a counterpoint to claims that the COVID-19 pandemic led to an increased awareness of the critical nature of many types of 'low-skilled' work not previously recognised as essential. The study also extends previous research which has traced changes in language and its deployment during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: Biopolitics; COVID-19; Discourse Analysis; Frontline; Key worker; Necropolitics; War metaphor.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig. 1
Diachronic changes in use of front*line in the NOW GB corpus (NGB) between 1 January 2010 and 31 December 2021.
Fig 2
Fig. 2
Fluctuations in deaths involving COVID-19 (ONS, 2022) and relative frequency of front*line in the Coronavirus GB corpus (CorGB) during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK.
Fig 3
Fig. 3
Occupational domains of front*line in 300-line random samples taken from NGB-F1, NGB-F2 and CorGB-F.
Fig 4
Fig. 4
The parts of speech (POS) of front*line in 300-line random samples taken from NGB-F1, NGB-F2 and CorGB-F.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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