The identity China has shaped in the fight against COVID-19: A comparative discourse study

By conducting a comparative discourse analysis of the news reports in China Daily and news releases by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of China on COVID-19 prevention and control, this paper aims to reveal the identity China has shaped in the fight against COVID-19. Epidemic-related news materials were firstly collected on the official websites of China Daily and the MFA of China, and then the representative news items were selected as the research corpus according to the principles of relevance and representativeness. The methods of critical discourse analysis and comparative study were adopted to analyze the selected news items. It was found that the epidemic-related news reports in China Daily have constructed the national identity of a responsible power for China from the perspective of fighting the epidemic and maintaining domestic and international public health security, and this national identity is consistent with the one publicized to the international community through diplomatic channels.

An exploratory study on the 10-year dynamic changes of mental health policy development and media stigma reporting in China (2011-2020)

BACKGROUND

China has introduced a large number of national mental health policies over the past decade. However, few studies have touched on what changes the policies brought to the media.

AIMS

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between stigma reports, classifications of mental disorders (SMI: severe mental illness vs. CMD: common mental disorders) and sources of information (mental health professionals vs. non-mental health professionals) from 2011 to 2020 in China Daily, an established official media of China.

METHOD

This study consists of policy review and media review. The policy review reviewed the media management content in Chinese national plans, policies, and laws on mental health from 2011 to 2020. China Daily news articles reporting mental illness-related topics were included in this study as the media material. After a two-step review, the eligible news articles were coded with a structured codebook. The proportion and frequency of stigma depiction of mental disorders, classifications of mental disorders and source of information were counted by year. Chi-test was undertaken to determine the relationship between stigma reports and different classifications of mental disorders and sources of information. An exploratory analysis was conducted to explore the changes in depiction around time points of policy publications.

RESULTS

The number of anti-stigmatizing articles increased significantly from 2011 to 2020. There is a statistical difference in the proportion of stigmatizing codes between articles featuring SMI and CMD (χ2 = 44.56, p < .001) and different sources of information (χ2 = 78.49, p < .001). And the statistical difference remained over the decade.

CONCLUSION

The results of the research indicate that the media may have alleviated the problem of stigma. But the subtle stigmatization still exists, which needs joint efforts of the government and media.

Conceptual metaphors and image construction of China in the space probe reports of China Daily: a social cognitive approach

The success of Shenzhou XIII and Chang'e-5 mission became a milestone in China's aerospace history and represented China's latest attempt to contribute to international space industry, which greatly promoted the China's national image. However, rare studies have examined the image construction in aerospace field. Thus, this study takes conceptual metaphors as the guiding theory and studies conceptual metaphors in China Daily news release on Chang'e-5 and Shenzhou XIII from 2008 to 2021. It focuses on the types of metaphors used, the semantic features of the metaphors, and the characteristics of Chinese images in aerospace field. It is found that China Daily widely uses conceptual metaphors in its news release on space probe, which mainly includes 11 conceptual metaphor categories such as "endeavor," "great significance," "time" and "journey," and 20 types of conceptual metaphor subcategories, all of which are working together to construct the image of China in aerospace industry, which is characterized with the following features: a dream-building action with lofty goals, an enterprising action which represents the prosperity and progress of China, an exploratory action that is constantly forging ahead and pursuing, a leading action that opens a new chapter and leads a new journey, a braving action which dares to be the first to live in the space, and an achieving action to create a community with a shared future for mankind.