Beijing Olympics and the Images of China in Time and The Economist

碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 國際傳播英語碩士學程(IMICS) === 98 === This thesis explores whether hosting the Beijing Olympic Games has helped promote China’s images as measured by quantitative and qualitative analysis of news coverage on China in Time and The Economist. Content analysis showed that coverage on...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Kuo, Meng lin, 郭孟霖
Other Authors: Chu, Leonard L.
Format: Others
Language:en_US
Online Access:http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/5v5adw
Description
Summary:碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 國際傳播英語碩士學程(IMICS) === 98 === This thesis explores whether hosting the Beijing Olympic Games has helped promote China’s images as measured by quantitative and qualitative analysis of news coverage on China in Time and The Economist. Content analysis showed that coverage on China in both magazines increased as the Beijing Olympic Games neared. Both Time and The Economist paid the most attention to China’s “politics,” “economics,” and “society,” while “education” and “health” received the least coverage. The newsmagazines covered China more negatively than positively; however, Time demonstrated a friendlier stance towards China than The Economist. In terms of length of article, both magazines spent the most number of pages covering “general,” or articles that cover more than one subject, followed by “health” and “economics” in Time and “environment” and “economics” in The Economist. Discourse analysis showed the frames used to cover China in the newsmagazines were, China as a country that suppresses its people’s rights, China as a country full of chances yet beware of risks and uncertainties, China as a country working on environmental protection, China as a country short of resources, the Internet as a medium changing Chinese youth’s way of living, China as an unstable and unequal developing country, China as a country with flowering creativity amid low acceptance, China’s problematic education system yet willing to make changes, China lags in healthcare, disease surveillance and control. Manheim and Albritton (1994) argue that a nation’s image is boosted when positive coverage increases, while negative coverage decreases. This study found that hosting the Olympic Games helped promote China’s images in Time more significantly than in The Economist, particularly in “economics,” “environment,” “technology,” and “culture and leisure”.