An awful other: social imaginaries about the Venezuelan immigrant in the audiences of Chilean online press

The objective of the study is to analyze the discourse of the audiences of Chilean online newspaper Emol on Venezuelan immigration to identify the social imaginaries of the Venezuelan immigrant that this speech reproduces and to interpret them critically within the sociohistorical processes of formation of otherness and coloniality in Chile. A qualitative content analysis assisted by Atlas.ti was applied to the readers' comments in all journalistic articles on Venezuelan immigrants published in Emol from December 30, 2021 to December 30, 2022 (n = 1796). A total of 34 imaginaries were identified, which mostly project a negative vision of the Venezuelan immigrant. The male or generic Venezuelan immigrant is perceived mainly as an agent favored by the local power, awful or despicable, criminal, who must be expelled. The female Venezuelan immigrant is characterized as voluptuous, beautiful and selfish.