Australian Cultural Image Construction By Chinese Reality Shows:From A Cross-Cultural Communication Perspective

Compared with tourism and other China-Australia bilateral cultural exchange activities which are usually confined by time and space.media provides another channel for cultural communication that is more public-oriented due to their ubiquity and availability.Chinese reality shows filmed in Australia,marked by their dual attributes of informativity and entertainment,exhibit potential in transmitting Australian cultural images to Chinese audience and therefore promote China-Australia cultural communication on a daily basis.In order to examine to what degree these programs can fulfill this role,the thesis selected four representative Chinese reality shows,Where Are We Going.Dad?,We Are in Love,Viva la Romance and Running Man,applied qualitative content analysis and analyzed their representation of Australian cultural images,the image construction process and the implications thereof.Building on existent literature on national cultural image studies and the specific case of Australia,the thesis discussed the content of representation from three perspectives-Australian environment,Australian culture and Australian people.The country,in the four programs,has been represented generally as an oceanic wonderland which is paradisiacal in scenery and carefree in atmosphere.The dichotomous depiction of Western culture being the predominant in Australian society and Indigenous culture as solely symbols of the past characterized the representation of Australian culture,White people and Aborigines are the most portrayed in their respective cultural manifestations.For people from other ethnic background,they have served more as middlemen offering services and therefore neither them nor their cultures within Australian society are given much introduction.The character of most Australian people has been depicted in positive terms,but that does not apply to Aborigines.Besides,the representation is further marked by simplification.romanticization,and exoticization resulted from the commodification of the construction of Australian cultural images,and such trend is inherently correlated with the formats of the selected Chinese reality shows.All selected programs have been characterized by their specially designed civilian nature which strengthened the paradoxical representation.their pre-determined narrative frameworks which placed the portrayal of Australia at a subordinate position,and their mode of commercial cooperation for benefit-oriented tourism promotion which made the representation also embody characteristics of advertisements.These features guide the logic for production.Thus,although the reality shows touched upon a number of aspects in Australian society,the represented Australian cultural images have manifested many stereotypical traits.Such,as argued by the thesis,will possibly limit the programs' potential in having better China-Australia cultural communication.If a more positive outcome is expected,innovation in more diversified types of popular reality shows and an increase in the attention paid to the contents' cultural connotations may be of great importance.