Structural Vulnerability And Representational Vulnerability

The finished and ongoing social transformation and the intense social stratification in contemporary China has reconstructed the distribution and flow of the communication resources and public information between various parts of the society. It also formed new division among different social groups in such aspects like the possession of the communication resources, the access and use of mass media, the influence on the process of media production.Based on this social context, this study especially pay attention to the socially vulnerable groups' position and status quo in the communication field, which will focus on the following two research questions: the first is that Whether the unbalanced development and the intense social polarization in process of modernization lead to a structural imbalance of the distribution of communication resources, and then form a disadvantageous stratum of information and communication? while the second is What influence will the media's political and economic subsistence exert on the representation of the vulnerable groups' social condition and the characterization of their image?According to above questions, this paper will make "Contextual" analysis and investigation to the topic of "mass communication and socially vulnerable groups", in virtue of the following research designs, such as putting it into the academic paradigm of Communication and Development, using the theoretical resources of theories of Social Stratification and Political Economy of Communication, taking the approach...