Images Of Mainlande Tourists From The Hong Kong Media

As the rapid development of Chinese economy, mainland and Hong Kong have witnessed varied cooperation in the field of economy, culture and other social activities.Residents of two places have intensified their interactive communication,due to special historical and geographical factors,Hong Kong attracts an increasing number of mainland tourists to visiting.In recent years, more and more mainland tourists went to Hong Kong for visiting. At the end of June 2013, the number of mainland tourists who had visited Hong Kong is more than 114 million. The arrival of mainland tourists made a contrib--ution for the development of Hong Kong’s economy, but due to various reasons, the contradictions and frictions between the mainland tourists and Hong Kong residents are increasing. It attracted public attention and was reported extensively by media. Hong Kong media represented the media image of mainland visitors through news reports. It has a profound impact for Hong Kong audience’s cognition for the group of mainland tourists. Therefore, it has great significance of understanding how Hong Kong media represent mainland tourists, what image they represent, and analyzing why it represent such an image.Founded in 1939, Hong Kong Sing Pao has a long history of 76 years. It has always been oriented to public demand, taken orders to fair and objective spirit of journalistic professionalism. So it won domestic and international good public credibility and guiding force. Therefore, it is more representative to choose Sing Pao as the study sample. This paper selected the reports about mainland tourists on Sing Pao during 2010 to 2014 as the research object. Using the methods of content analysis and text analysis, it attempts to explore how Hong Kong media represent this group’s image, and summarize the media image of mainland tourists, further more, analysis and reflect the main reasons of this phenomenon.This article chose 412 days’ Sing Pao(1.1, 2010-12.31, 2014)as the newspaper samples. And it selected 124 reports that are about mainland tourists as the study cases. The first part described the research methods and sampling method of this paper; the second part made a statistical analysis for the reporting content and reporting methods of the reporting samples, including the number of reports, themes, topics, sources, keynote, layout, genre and the length of reporting; the third part made a statistical analysis for the mainland tourists’ media image and the characteristics; the fourth part reflected the study results and analyzed the main reasons for the formation of mainland tourists’ media image.Studies suggest that, Sing Pao shows four major media images of mainland tourists: wealthy mainland tourists; uncivilized mainland tourists; tourists who have damage to the interests; and tourists who tried to snatch Hong Kong’s resources. Finally it concluded the cause of the phenomenon: the impact of the political system is the most important factor; the tendency of the media commercialization impacts the reporting methods and content; and Hong Kong’s news media traditions and its colonial culture are important factors that affect the reports of mainland tourists.