From Personal Image To National Image

In recent years,“first ladies”,as a unique diplomatic role,have become more influential on the international stage.They are not only the partner of national leaders but also the outstanding representative female image of the country,who are a valuable source for presenting a softer national image of the country.Meanwhile,they have attracted much attention from media at home and abroad.Therefore,it is of great significance for China to disseminate a favorable and refreshing national image with its first lady as a channel to promote Chinese culture.Peng Liyuan,as the First Lady of China,inevitably receives a great deal of media expectation and association with the Chinese image.But given that media report usually implies media’s stances and attitudes,it will influence the presentation of China’s and Peng’s image in the media.Therefore,it is of great significance to study the impact of attitude conveyed in reports on China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan.For media discourse equipped with special linguistic features and image construction functions,this study integrates the Attitude System in Appraisal Theory,the Theory of Political Figures’ Images and the 4D Model of the country image to construct the new analytical framework of “Theoretical Framework for Image Analysis from the Perspective of Attitude System”.Under the guidance of this framework,Attitude resources in the domestic and foreign English news about China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan are explored to address three research questions below:(1)What are the similarities and differences of Attitude resources in the domestic and foreign English news about China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan?(2)What are the images of Peng shaped by these Attitude resources? And what are the underlying reasons for these features?(3)What are the national images of China represented by Peng’s personal images in the domestic and foreign English news?According to the research questions,this study adopts a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods.A mini corpus of 27398 words is constructed for this study including 60(30 by Chinese journalists and 30 by foreign reporters)pieces of news from the news Corpus “Lexis Nexis”.At the same time,the tools,such as MS Word,ANTCONC and R programming language,are utilized to annotate,calculate and test(Fisher’s exact test)Attitude resources adopted in news.Through the comparison of the frequencies and ratios of Attitude resources in news by Chinese and foreign reporters,this study analyzes the similarities and differences in their construction of the image of China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan,the underlying reasons for these features and the represented national images of China.Based on the analysis,this study found that:(1)The distributional features of Attitude resources in news from China and foreign countries exhibit both similarities and differences.As for similarities,Chinese and foreign reporters prefer affective mental process but avoid affective comment to improve readability and ensure objectivity respectively.In terms of differences,Chinese journalists are inclined to adopt Affect resources to build emotional connections with readers and employ Social Sanction resources to present the humanity of China’s First Lady.In contrast,foreign reporters adopt more Social Esteem resources as well as Reaction and Composition resources in Appreciation to make a positive evaluation of China’s First Lady.(2)Different choices in Attitude resources in Chinese and foreign media contribute to the diversity of image construction of China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan,and these differences are originated from different ethical and aesthetic values in China and foreign countries.To be specific,under the influence of Collectivism and implicit aesthetic values,Chinese media focus on social integrity and prefer to present the energy and humanity of China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan in order to construct her Energetic image and Ethic image.Meanwhile,foreign media which believe in Individualism and explicit aesthetic values concentrate primarily on personal capacity and tend to display China’s First Lady’s achievements and outfits,which contributes to the construction of her Aptitude image and Visual image.(3)The multi-dimensional concepts of China’s national image are demonstrated by the various appearance of China’s first lady Peng Liyuan in media at home and abroad.On the one hand,through the description of China’s First Lady’s Energetic image and Ethic image,Chinese media arouse readers’ emotional experiences and China is presented as a country that pays attention to social harmony and kinship from the emotional and normative perspectives accordingly.On the other hand,the presentation of China’s First Lady’s Aptitude and Visual image by foreign media is able to construct China as a competent,open and inclusive country from the functional and esthetic perspectives.In summary,the present study discusses the differences in the construction of China’s national image and its first lady’s image in Chinese and foreign media,by means of investigating the distributional characteristics of Attitude resources in their English news about China’s First Lady Peng Liyuan.The research findings provide empirical support for the construction of China’s international discourse system,which helps China effectively establish a cross-cultural identity in external publicity and enhances its discourse influence in the international community.