A Comparative Study Of Coverage On Diao Yu Island Between Chinese And American Medias

Diaoyu Islands are the inherent territory of China since ancient times. Thoughknown as the leftover problem of history, the issue of Diaoyu Islands is in its nature adispute over territory between China and Japan. Since the establishment of diplomaticrelationship in1972, a policy of suspending dispute and promoting commondevelopment had been agreed by both sides for the purpose of maintaining thenewly-established relationship. With the normalization of the diplomatic relations, aswell as the changes took place in global landscape and Japan’s domestic policy,Japan’s policy on Diaoyu Islands had changed as well. Since the end of1970, as amajor international territorial dispute, the rising Diaoyu Island issue has rapidlyattracted attention from global media.Under such a heat-debated environment, the content, characteristics andtendency of foreign report by China will undoubtedly play an essential role insafeguarding the domestic environment for public opinion and the overall image inthe world. As the most influential figure in world news and communication industry,America with its great influence on Western media’s report on this issue, will offerimportant reference in report content, way and characteristics for China, which willhelp it to carry out strategy for foreign report.This paper has chosen all the news coverage from December11th2012toJanuary1st2013about dispute over Diaoyu Islands on People’s daily and New YorkTimes, two most representative and authoritative news papers. This paper hasobjectively and specifically analyzed the different features shown in the two papersand the reasons for that. This will not only help Chinese media to enhance itsfollow-up report ability on Diaoyu Dispute, but will also safeguard China’s nationalimage as a major power, so as to nurture a sound international public opinionenvironment for foreign relations.Such methods as documentary method, content analysis, text analysis, andcomparative method have been used to study the sample. This paper has been dividedinto6chapters, among which the first chapter has introduced the background and purpose, second and third chapter comparatively analyzed the frequency, theme, andsource of the two media reports with methods of content and text analysis, andconclusions have been made. Chapter two and three would be the main part of thepaper. Chapter four has focused on the cause of the difference between the two newspapers’ report on the issue, which may include state position, the nature of the mediaand readers psychology. In Chapter five a proposal has been carried out, first is thenecessity of rationally viewing both advantages and disadvantages of western media,so as to draw its strong point and avoid weakness, second is the necessity to enhancethe power of Chinese media, since it can take an advantageous position among foreignmedia only when it enhances its ability. Chapter six would focus on the weakness ofthe paper.