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Sibo Chen

Sibo Chen

Associate Professor | Graduate Program Director
Office RCC 382E
Phone(416) 979-5000 x6384

Dr. Sibo Chen is a critical communication scholar by training, with areas of interest that include Environmental Communication, Risk and Crisis Communication, Social Media, Transcultural Political Economy, and Critical Discourse Analysis. Currently, he serves as Executive Board Members of the International Environmental Communication Association (external link)  as well as the Canadian Communication Association (external link) .

Research Interests

Dr. Chen's current research explores how political polarization is communicated in the public sphere, focusing on three topics: political contention over climate change, online mis/disinformation, and the rise of anti-Asian racism.

Selected Publications (also see Academia.edu (external link) )

  • Chen, S. (2025). The political economy of environmental communication: The Chinese context. In Lee Edwards et al. (eds.), The Sage Handbook of Promotional Culture and Society. Sage.
  • Chen, S. (2024). Reporting in a time of crisis: Progressive alternative media's coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. Journalism Practices, 18(6), 1542-1559.
  • Chen, S. (2023). Energy politics and discourse in Canada: Probing progressive extractivism. Routledge.
  • Chen, S., & Zhao, Y. (2022). China’s ecological civilization: A blindspot in global environmental discourse. Environmental Communication, 16(2), 195-208.
  • Chen, S., & Wu, C. (2021). #StopAsianHate: Understanding the global rise of anti-Asian racism from a transcultural communication perspective. Journal of Transcultural Communication, Online First.
  • Chen, S. (2020). Debating extractivism: Stakeholder communications in British Columbia’s liquefied natural gas controversy. Sage Open, 10(4). 
  • Chen, S. (2019). How to discredit a social movement: Negative framing of “Idle No More” in Canadian print media. Environmental Communication, 13(2), 144-151.
  • Chen, S. (2018). Exploring the formation of the “leave-it-to-experts” storyline during the initial outbreak of the 2013 smog hazard in Beijing. Chinese Journal of Communication, 11(4), 385-399.
  • Chen, S. (2017). Toward multiple conceptions of the human–nature relationship: The "human–nature unity" frame in a Chinese village. International Journal of Communication, 11, 4481–4498.
  • Chen, S. (2016). Selling the environment: Green marketing discourse in China's automobile advertising. Discourse, Context & Media, 12, 11-19.