Spektrum Iran

Abstract This study investigates how Persian-speaking users on X interpret and emotionally respond to DeepSeek, a Chinese-developed large language model. Drawing on a curated corpus of 1,112 posts collected from Iranian users, the research employs a mixed-method approach incorporating sentiment analysis, topic modeling, and co-occurrence network analysis. The findings reveal a layered discursive landscape in which DeepSeek serves not merely as a technological product but as a symbolic site for negotiating issues of geopolitical alignment, epistemic trust, and technological aspiration. Six major affective orientations—neutrality, skepticism, hope, pride, anxiety, and dismissiveness—structure user engagement with the model, reflecting ambivalent yet politically informed responses. Thematic analysis identified eight recurring topics, including performance comparisons, Chinese sovereignty, AI ethics, and cultural identity, which often co-occurred in complex rhetorical configurations. These results suggest that Iranian users deploy DeepSeek as a proxy to reflect on domestic technological constraints, platform politics, and the shifting contours of global AI hegemony.