A Comparative Study On Question Preface In Chinese And American Press Conferences

The present thesis is devoted to comparing the use of question preface in Chinese and American press release. There has been scattered research in this regard in English literature and still less in Chinese counterpart. This study aims at unveiling the similarities and differences in prefacing the questions posed by journalists so that a better understanding about the nature and feature of Chinese and American press release can be achieved for mutual reference.The corpus of the study is the authoritative transcript of press release from the official website of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of PRC and U. S. Department of State. Around 300 question & response pairs are randomly selected in both transcripts respectively without any discrimination, yielding a databank of 100,000 words. And these materials are meticulously studied and compared so as to answer the successive 3 research questions,1) Is there any difference in terms of the frequency of using preface in the questioning act of journalists in Chinese and American contexts? What are the contributing factors? 2) Is there any format that can characterize the form and content of question preface in both settings? 3) What are the functions performed by the preface in questioning the spokesperson from the journalists?The operational definition of question preface in the current study is the remainder of question proper in a questioning turn. So preface might occupy the position before or after the question itself.A comparative analysis suggests the following results,1) 85.9% of the questions in Chinese corpus are prefaced, while only 37.2% of those in American corpus is in prefaced form; and this salient divergence can be accounted for from the different turn-taking patterns. The procedure of Chinese press conference basically follows the "one-journalist-one-turn" rule, while this strict turn-taking pattern is often flouted in American press conference. In the Chinese context, topics hop from one to another, so questions are prefaced so as to contextualize the very question under discussion; 2) question preface in both contexts shares a lot in common in terms of its structure and content, which proves that the press conference, irrespective of its country, journalism culture, journalist-politician relation, is highly instititutionalized in nature. It's exhibited in the fact that the journalists tend to distance themselves from the issue under discussion by avoiding first person narrative and that source of the information is clearly presented in the preface so as to claim authority and exhibit neutrality in their argument. What's more, the discrepancy across the press conferences is also obvious, as we see abundant follow-ups and interruptions (between the journalists and between the journalist and the spokesperson), varying ways of being polite and cooperative, etc. They have their roots deep in the cultural and ideological differences; 3) Preface performs multi-layered functions, such as initiating a new topic, competing for opportunities to raise more questions, setting and tightening the agenda and providing rationale for question proper, etc. Contextualizing the subsequent question and exerting pressure are functions of the greatest importance. A comparison of preface hostility in the corpora reveals that the questions in American press conference are generally more hostile in nature, while Chinese prefaced questions are overwhelmingly innocuous in character.The findings indicate that question preface is used in a similar way in Chinese and American contexts, which certifies that press conference, different from daily conversations and other types of institutional talk, carries strong features of institutionalization. The frequency difference of question preface is resulted from different turn-taking patterns.Follow-up, interruption and simultaneous talk, which are considered to be initiative and probing, are common acts in American press conference, but they are rare in Chinese press conference. Therefore journalists at Chinese press conferences may adopt adequate measures, such as asking follow-up questions and skillfully designing question preface, so as to give full play to the scrutinizing role of the media.