How American Media Construct China's Image

In the international communications, it is a fact without dispute that media have an influence on the construction and understanding of the images of other countries. However, American media, with their strong economy, advanced technology, rich experience in communications and the advantage of its language, play a significant role in the construction of the images of other countries. Therefore, the study of American media's reports on China is meaningful in theory as well as in practice.Framing analysis, which came into being in 1980s, has been taken seriously in recent years, and it sets up a new research paradigm for studying media reports. In this thesis, a framing analysis has been conducted on Newsweek's reports on China from 1997 to 2002. The framing analysis goes in the form of "issue frames" analysis and "reporting frame" analysis.In the part of "issue frames" analysis, six major issues constructing China's image have been identified and then each analyzed in terms of volume of coverage and the trend of the issues, with a view to presenting China's image thus reflected.And in the part of "reporting frame" analysis, a discourse analysis has been performed on a freely-chosen news text in terms of theme, structure and key words, with a view to understanding how Newsweek frames a news event.The findings show that Newsweek constructs China's image through certain issues selected and represented in a "dispute frame" to meet the interests of American people. But the reports still boast of a seemingly objectivity due to such measures as conveying viewpoints and values through other people's oral responses to the news event, or through piecing up the previous events about the news to make up a certain context.In the last part of this thesis, it is analyzed that the attitude and methods of Newsweek's reports on China result from an interaction of journalists' norms and practices and the influence of interest groups. It is further suggested that relatively more objective reports on China might be achieved if more contacts are encouraged to make American media understand China better.