| Since the reform and opening up,China's national power has grown rapidly.But compared with the rapid growth in hard power,the soft power of China is still not strong.The national image,which is an important symbol of national soft power,has played an important role in international competition.Thus,shaping a good national image has become an important means of seeking and safeguarding national interests.Afghanistan is one of the countries along the “Belt and Road” initiative.Different “Silk Road” plans proposed by other countries are also attractive to Afghanistan.The reciprocity of the “Belt and Road” cannot only rely on the economic aid and the infrastructure investment,but also requires Afghanistan's recognition and resonance of the “Belt and Road” initiative and Chinese policies.Therefore,it is necessary to understand Afghanistan and its people's perception of China.For Afghan people,their subjective perception of China mainly depends on the news media.In other words,the China-related reports of the Afghan news media can guide and strengthen the Afghan people's subjective perception of China's national image.Then,it is particularly essential and urgent to study the China-related reports of Afghan mainstream media for the spread and construction of China's national image.In order to grasp Afghanistan's perception of China and the reasons for such cognitive deviation from reality,this dissertation conducts an interdisciplinary analysis of the linguistic and semiotic action,social impact,and context of the Afghan mainstream network media in constructing China's national image.It selects the corpus consisting of 601 Pashto China-related reports from January 2012 to December 2019 that were obtained from Tolo News and Pajhwok Afghan News,and incorporates in analysis the theories of constructivism,discursive illusions,and international communication with the application of content analysis,corpus analysis,and quantitative and qualitative analysis.Through the above analysis,this dissertation intends to offer some related references to improve the national image of China in Afghanistan.Based on the study of China's national image construction from the Afghan mainstream network media,this dissertation finds that the Afghan mainstream network media has deliberately chosen the discourse subject and discourse content in the Pashto China-related reports,that the discourse power of the reports is in the hands of the Afghan local media and western media,and that the content of the reports highlights two topics: “Sino-Afghanistan relations” and “China's national conditions”.At the same time,through the use of metaphors,such as “counter-terrorism is a war”,“peace is a journey”,“country is a person”,“Afghanistan is a stage”,the Afghan mainstream network media have guided the audience to accept the frame of China's status and role,that is,the supporter of counter-terrorism,the maintainer of peace and the major supportive actor in solving the Afghan problem.Overall,due to the influence of such factors like the change of political and economic power structure initiated by China's strong rise,the global communication pattern of “Western Strong and East Weak”,the Sino-Afghanistan friendship and pragmatic cooperation in every field in the 21 st century and China's policy on Afghanistan,the interaction between the self-interest of the Afghan mainstream media and the national interests of Afghanistan,the Afghan social stereotypes of socialism,the historical logic that a great power is bound to seek hegemony,the difference in religious belief systems,and western values,Afghan mainstream network media has constructed the following national images of China: a firm supporter for Afghanistan's peace and development and a responsible great power with rapid and peaceful rise.But at the same time,China is also demonized by Afghan mainstream network media as a socialist country that is more powerful and tougher,who lacks democracy and has global ambitions,with potential threats and serious human rights violation. |
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