Digital gastronationalism: how “white people food” discourse constructs national identity on Douyin

This study investigates the “white people food” (白人饭) meme on Douyin as a manifestation of digital gastronationalism. Through critical discourse analysis of comments on a viral video, the research identifies four strategies transforming everyday food talk into national boundary-work: essentialization of cultural differences; moralization linking cooking to character; somatization framing taste as biological incompatibility; and scientification deploying nutritional and Traditional Chinese Medicine discourse to legitimize hierarchies. These strategies circulate through platform affordances that reward memetic content, fostering a participatory, algorithmically mediated nationalism. Beyond culinary preferences, these debates serve as proxy arenas for negotiating health norms and cultural confidence. The findings demonstrate how ordinary users appropriate and adapt state cultural scripts, making nationalism feel simultaneously inevitable and negotiable within digital environments.