A Comparative Analysis Of Attitudes In News Reports On China-US Trade War Based On Appraisal Theory

News reports,as the most common and efficient means of mass media,play an important role in people's daily life.The China-US trade war is a major event between China and America in recent years.It has lasted for a long time and drawn worldwide attention.An analysis of the appraisal systems of the relevant news reports may reveal the focus of the China-US trade war in different periods and the attitudes of Chinese and American media to this event.However,few studies have been found focusing on the comparative analysis of the attitudes in the news reports of the China-US trade war from the perspective of Appraisal Theory.Therefore,this thesis is to make a comparative analysis of the attitudes held by the Chinese and American media in the news reports on the China-US trade war from the perspective of Appraisal Theory.A corpus of 60 news reports on the China-US trade war is used in this study,in which 30 news are from China Daily and 30 are from Washington Post,New York Times and Wall Street Journal respectively.The study is conducted based on three periods(the period of China-US trade friction,which lasted from March 23,2018 to July 6,2018;the period of China-US trade war,which lasted from July 6,2018 to September 24,2018;the period of the alleviation of China-US trade war,which lasted from September 24,2018 to December 5,2018).By adopting quantitative and qualitative analysis methods,this thesis makes a comparative analysis of the appraisal words in the news reports on China-US trade war in three periods from the perspective of attitude,engagement and graduation,aiming to reveal the attitudes held by different media on the China-US trade war in different periods.The major findings are as follows: firstly,concerning the attitude resources,in the first period,the evaluation focus was on the trade war launched by the US against the Chinese ZTE Corporation.China Daily had a positive evaluation on China's ability to deal with the US trade war,meanwhile it negatively evaluated the trade war initiated by the US.However,the US newspapers made a positive evaluation on the economic strength of America,but they negatively evaluated Chinese ZTE Corporation.In the second period,the evaluation focus was on the US government's trade policy.Both China Daily and the US newspapers had a negative evaluation on this issue.In the third period,the evaluation focus was on the China-US leaders' meeting in Buenos Aires.Both China Daily and the US newspapers had a positive evaluation on this meeting.Secondly,as far as the engagement resources are concerned,both the Chinese and the US newspapers adopted more disclaim resources than proclaim resources.The large employment of disclaim resources in the news reports showed the negative attitudes held by both sides on the China-US trade war.The employment of entertain and attribute resources made the news reports on the China-US trade war more objective and convincible.Thirdly,in terms of graduation resources,both the Chinese and the US newspapers preferred the force resources more than the focus resources.Specifically,both sides preferred intensification than quantification,sharpen than soften.By adopting a large number of graduation resources,the journalists' attitudes and stands are clearly expressed and the objectivity of the news reports is improved.