Transitivity Analysis Of The South China Sea Related Reports From Los Angeles Times

Critical discourse analysis(hereafter CDA)explores the ideology behind the discourse,through analyzing linguistic features and social and historical backgrounds in which the discourse is produced,reveals the influence of the ideology on the discourse and vice versa,and tries to uncover the complicated relations among the language,power and ideology.Although transitivity theory has found more and more favor in critical analyses of news reports,few researches on the news reports about the South China Sea with transitivity theory have been conducted so far.The rising tension in the South China Sea has caught the world’s eye.Amid the tense situation,a critical analysis of the news reports about disputes of the South China Seas is conducted,with transitivity theory in SFG as the theoretical framework.This thesis adopts qualitative and quantitative research methods to analyze the selected 20 news reports about disputes of the South China Sea from Los Angeles Times.According to the distribution of transitivity processes,this thesis analyzes four main processes: material processes,verbal processes,relational processes and mental processes.During the analysis,all clauses are divided into the Chinese Side and the American Side in terms of the Subject.Finally,a critical analysis is finished based on the data to explore the hidden ideology and the differences in portraying the image of China and that of America.The analysis of the reports from Los Angeles Times shows a difference in the distribution of transitivity processes.On the Chinese Side,the frequently used processes range as follows: material processes > relational processes > verbal processes > mental processes.While on the American Side,the distribution is different: verbal processes > material processes > relational processes > mental processes.On one hand,China’s voices are ignored and almost all quotations from China highlight China’s determination to claim territorial sovereignty in the South China Sea,but the expressions about China advocating a peaceful settlement of the disputes by bilateral negotiations are omitted.Relational processes pay more attentionto the negative results by China’s actions and China’s increasingly aggressive posture towards the disputes.Material processes focus on the large-scale island-building projects of China and Chinese military activities and thus China behaves like an aggressor.On the other hand,quotations from the American Side occupy a large coverage and the voices are from different social classes from both America and its allies.Moreover,negative comments on China dominate the quotations.American moves in the South China Sea are interpreted as responses to the pressure under its Asian allies,aiming to offset the rising regional influence of China and thus maintain the regional stability,and the conclusion can be drawn that America is portrayed as a guardian of peace.Behind the depiction of the images of the two countries stand out the ideological differences between America and China.America plans to work together with China in handling international affairs but it feels being challenged by the rapid rise of China.America is worried about that China’s rise may hurt its interests and its regional influence in the Western Pacific.With transitivity theory,the critical analysis of news reports about the disputes of the South China Sea from Los Angeles Times further reveals the hidden ideology behind news reports,which is useful for audiences or readers to cultivate and promote their critical awareness.