A Comparative Study Of Time And China Daily's Reports On Sino-Japanese Relations From The Perspective Of Critical Discourse Analysis

Critical linguistics is a theoretical framework for discourse analysis born in the late 1970s. Based mainly on Halliday's systemic-functional grammar, it seeks to unveil the hidden ideologies, power relations and in particular the relationship between language and ideology. Taken for granted as common sense by people, the ideologies hidden behind the language can affect people's cognition directly or indirectly and play an important role in the construction of people's attitudes and ideologies. The Mass media discourse is often laden with ideologies. Therefore, it has become an important research subject of critical linguistics.The purposes of the present study are as follows:1. Demonstrate the value of critical linguistics in the analysis of mass media discourses.2. Explore the hidden ideologies in mass media discourses and their influences on readers'cognition.3. Evaluate Chinese media's efforts in influencing international public opinions, and provide ideas for China's international communication strategies.In order to achieve these goals, this thesis will take some of Time and China Daily's news reports on Sino-Japanese relations as data, adopt critical discourse analysis and Halliday's systemic-functional linguistics as the main theory and methodology, and conduct a comparative analysis to illustrate the interaction between discourses and ideologies. The same news reports will also be analyzed under the guidance of Walter Lippmann's mass communication theory to study the acceptance and consumption of mass media discourses, and the consequent influences on the audience's attitudes.