Research On China's Economic Image In British And American Mainstream Media From The Perspective Of Transitivity

With the acceleration of China's globalization process,China's international influence has been greatly enhanced.The mainstream media reports of China's economy in Britain and the United States have greatly affected the world people's perception of China's economic image.In this historical background,the research on the construction of China's economic image has received great attention from the academic community.Based on the transitivity theory of Systemic Functional Linguistics,this study analyzes news reports on China's economy in the British and American mainstream media.The purpose is to explore the China's economic image in the British and American mainstream media and its reflected ideology.This study applies transitivity theory in Halliday's Systematic Functional Linguistics.Using Brat,Editplus 3.0 and Treetagger 3 as research tools,the combination of quantitative and qualitative research methods are used.The author collected and screened 100 reports as the study samples from the British and American mainstream media of The New York Times,The Washington Post,The Guardian and The Times.The stage is divided into the first period from 2001 to 2010 and the second period from 2011 to 2019.This study discusses the participants,processes,and circumstances of transitivity in China's economic reports.Firstly,it analyzes the distribution of participants,processes,and circumstances of transitivity in British and American mainstream media news.Secondly,it discusses the realization process of the participants,processes and circumstances in these two periods.Finally,it analyzes the diachronic changes of China's economic image constructed in different periods by the British and American mainstream media and the reasons.Based on the above analysis,this study finds that:(1)In the first period(2001-2010),the British and American mainstream media used relatively negative words to describe China's economic development policies,and constructed a negative China's economic image for news audiences;In the second period(2011-2019),the British and American mainstream media used neutral or positive words to explain the current status of China's economic development,and shaped a more positive China's economic image.(2)The British and American mainstream media reports on the China's economy are not positive in language and there is a phenomenon of misinterpretation of China's economic development policy.This attitude is influenced by the politics,economy and culture of the British and American countries at the time.However,as China's economy has grown stronger,the British andAmerican mainstream media have changed their attitudes towards China's various economic reports.In the second period,they have constructed a relatively positive China's economic image.Based on the transitivity system and through diachronic analysis,the author finds that China's economic image shaped by the Britain and the America is relatively positive in the second period than in the first period.This study provides a reference for the study of economic news texts from the perspective of transitivity.It is helpful to inspire readers to understand the national image.