Discursive Construction Of Chinese University Identity In Its Prospectus

This thesis is presented to study the discursive construction of Chinese university identity in the prospectus with Peking University as the case. The data used is the prospectus selected from Peking University's official website.Combining Wodak's Discourse-historical approach and Halliday's transitivity analysis, the present investigation offers a description of the data trying to find out what identities Peking University constructs and how it constructs them in the prospectus.We come to a conclusion that referential and predicational strategies are realized by various linguistic devices constructing Peking University as an institution of higher education with comprehensive disciplines, long history, patriotism, social responsibility, humanistic spirit, major support from the state, outstanding capability in training talents and doing scientific research. In addition, Peking University is most frequently constructed as an active actor who is endowed with capabilities, resources and leadership in transitivity system. They collectively aim at discursively building the organization's identity as the most prestigious higher education institution in China, which has great confidence in becoming one of the world's first class universities.The present study offers a new piece of research that testifies the successful application of Wodak's Discourse-historical approach and Halliday's transitivity analysis into the study of the discursive construction of organizational identity, applying it to a new context which had been rarely studied. Peking University's identity has been approached from a new perspective. Another strength of the present work is that the organization's identity has been studied through new lenses on how it is constructed in its prospectus. Thus, some illumination can be achieved for other organizations in composing the prospectus on how to create or establish certain identities for the organization.