Chinese Image Construction In Western Documentaries Since The New Century

In recent years,western media has made a large number of documentaries about China,which generally presents a contradictory reporting framework.On the one hand,it focuses on China’s rise,showing a fully affirmative attitude and the intention to seek cooperation;on the other hand,based on their own interests,they worry about the threat posed by China’s rise,therefore they always criticize and keep their close eyes on China.In the transmission of national image,documentary,as an important form of media information transmission,plays an essential role in shaping the image of the country because of its objective and authentic characteristics.However,in the production process of China-related documentaries by foreign media,there is always an “image frame”,which means that media workers selectively shape China in the eyes of the “others”,influenced by many complicated factors such as ideology,national interests,media environment,and individual cognition.By studying the China-related documentaries produced by Western media,the purpose of this paper is to analyze the media presentation and construction of China in the eyes of the “others”.This paper focuses on 41 Western documentaries about China since 2000.First of all,the framework theory is used to grasp the framework of Chinese issues in Western documentaries.Secondly,CDA(Critical Discourse Analyses)is introduced into the analysis of the documentary to help interpret the symbolic biaxial relationship in documentary text and discourse in a detailed and in-depth way,trying to reveal the discourse prejudice in the Western documentary and its cause.Video symbols in the documentary samples are analyzed to study the visual expression techniques and strategies adopted by the China-related documentaries in Europe to present the image of China since the new century.Finally,it provides strategies for the international transmission of China’s national image.