An Appraisal Study Of China’s Image Built By Newsweek

Appraisal has become an important issue in linguistics since the1990s, holdingconsiderable significance in analyzing discourse structure and in understanding theinteraction between language and context of culture. In China, Appraisal has beengaining ever-increasing attention. Appraisal theory, initiated by Jim Martin and PeterWhite (2005), is regarded as the expansion of Interpersonal metafunction in Halliday’sSystemic Functional Linguistics. Thus a continuum has been reached in the sphere ofinterpersonal meaning, of which one end stands Halliday’s contribution of Mood andModality, and the other is gravitated by explicit evaluative devices in thelexical-grammatical level, greatly enriching the realization of interpersonal meaning. Italso concerns how Interpersonal value is freighted through Ideational meaning when thelatter is appraisal-laden (namely, how to identify Token of Judgment), the importance ofcontext in the verification of evaluative resources, and the role of reader positioning inthe interpretation of attitudes. All the aforementioned openings offer promising researchgrounds for this thesis.A Macro-and-Micro level model on Token of Judgment in journalistic reports hasbeen discussed.“Motif” and “Probabilities of catchphrases” are the components of theMacro-level, the former being widely applied in a variety of subjects for the benefit ofgauging the general trend; the latter—“Probability”, due to its position in the six coretheoretical rationales in Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics, serving as one ofthe pillars for concepts like reports and playing a substantial role in Ideational andInterpersonal meanings. The Micro-level framing, Cryptic evaluative resource that is, isfurther divided into subcategories such as “Presupposition” and “Projection”. Thistwo-level framework, combined with Attitude (interpreted in this thesis as Phenotypicevaluative device in Micro-level) and Graduation in Appraisal network, forms theevaluative resources in journalistic reports.This research attempts to explore Token of Judgment in journalistic reports—inlight of the untapped areas mentioned above. The other intends to build a small corpusincorporating reports centered on China in Newsweek from2003,2005and2013, for thepurpose of analyzing how China’s image is constructed in Newsweek guided by the model of Token of Judgment.The corpus-based data involves about150issues in Newsweek, among which thereexist more than160pieces of reports that are centered on China. The Macro-levelanalysis is done within the field of all the databank, with the aid of computer assistedWord Count software. The Micro-level work focuses upon core paragraphs inNewsweek (2013), collecting statistics by doing sentence-by-sentence breakdown.The research results reveal: on the whole, the number of reports on China in thedata pool is on the rise annually, and so is the case in Motifs. Though wider and closerattention has been given to China, negative Motifs rise sharply on special occasions.The study on Probability of catchphrases reveals that in major US news media the coldwar mentality still lingers, and that at the same time topics like “economicdevelopment” and “China’s rise” have received different degrees of attention. Therefore,a split image has been formulated through the Macro-level framing.At Micro-level, there are varied patterns of distribution for Cryptic evaluations indifferent kinds of reports, whereas the entire amount of the evaluative percentages aremore or less the same, which unveils the fact that all the reports, no matter what kind ofreports, tend to be equally value-laden in portraying China. So far as the Newsweek isconcerned, it is relatively objective, balanced, and mild in tone, but negatively inclinedin image presentation.This thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter one introduces the realm of interest ofthe present study, explicating the purposes and significance of the study. Preceded withthe literature review on Appraisal theory, Chapter two attempts to elaborate the contentsof Token of Judgment from the combination of Macro-and-Micro perspective, aframework which paves the way for subsequent analysis. Chapter three introduces theresearch questions and data processing procedures. The emphasis of Chapter four isdwelt in the statistical work on the Motifs and Probability of catchphrases in Newsweekin three selected years. Analytical results are summarized respectively.Sentence-by-sentence breakdown analysis is also taken up in the targeted areas in thecorpus, with some samples singled out for detailed examination. The results arranged indiagrams help to reveal the correlations between different kinds of reports and thecorresponding appraisal resources adopted when presenting the image of China. Thischapter is also concerned with the image building and perception framing from thestandpoint that couples Macro-level and Micro one, compounded by related data and figures from China and abroad in order to achieve a better interpretation on the researchfindings. The final chapter of the thesis, Chapter five, draws together what have beendiscussed and analyzed in the previous chapters, locates the insufficiency of the currentstudy, and proposes the orientation for future work.China has been maintaining the momentum of rapid development in anunprecedented and sustainable way, and her international status and the role in worldaffairs are consequently facing new challenges. Power relations, especiallySino-American relations are constantly prioritized. Judged from this perspective, theresearch of appraisal theory and its corresponding data analysis are helpful attempts inenlarging Appraisal theory as well as in exploring the social functional aspects ofSystemic Functional Linguistics.