Body, health, prevention: media-constructed discourses and living culture in the age of new “bio-realities”

The virus itself is a “biological agent” (Pleyers 2020), but due to the wide and far-reaching consequences of the COVID19 disease pandemic, it is impossible to treat it as an exclusively health topic. Since the beginning of the crisis, the sociological and anthropological community has been questioning various aspects and dimensions of the crisis. The project inaugurates an integrative approach that investigates the issue of the disease COVID19 on three levels: as a discourse constructed through the media and public health documents; as “materialities and practices” (Will 2020) of prevention and “lived culture” (Branston and Stafford 2010); as “neoliberal bio-reality” (Špoljar-Vržina 2008). The project contributes to research into socio-cultural aspects and consequences of the crisis caused by COVID-19; participation in establishing a new sociological subdiscipline; understanding of recent processes through the construction of dominant/marginal discourses and the lived culture of health; further development of the concept of “neoliberal bio-realities” and the expansion of the definition of the field of health/disease culture, as well as the development of new ways of collecting, synthesizing and integrating data in the context of the COVID-19 crisis. In the first project year, the focus was on the level of discourse analysis and methodological tools developed through qualitative methodology. In addition to mapping the area in the context of neoliberalization of healthcare, a discourse analysis of public health documents, visual material and newspaper texts published on two Croatian portals was carried out. In the second year, research was conducted in Zagreb with the aim of identifying the impact of discourse in the sphere of everyday life and complex life experiences and interpretations from the positions of research participants. The project opens up new research areas and strengthens interdisciplinary cooperation. The team published a number of scientific papers, participated in numerous scientific conferences and realized international cooperation in many aspects (see the section on the most important activities and results).