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- Title
Rise of China or Western Conspiracy? A Fantasy Theme Analysis.
- Authors
Mei Wu; Wen-bo Zhu
- Abstract
Mo Yan's award of the Nobel Prize in Literature provoked competing voices in the global Chinese media, ranging from official media to online citizen forums, and from Chinese mainland media to overseas Chinese Internet forums. Drawing on Symbolic Convergence Theory (SCT) and Fantasy Theme Analysis (FTA), our study explores to map the metaphorical symbolic landscape of different media responses. Our findings indicate that there were four rhetorical visions shared among media treatments of Mo Yan's award, which were further illustrated alongside five value orientations: nationalism, moralism, pragmatism, liberalism, and orientalism. Our cross-media mapping suggests: a) the dominant rhetorical response of Chinese official media implied a recognition of the Nobel Prize in Literature as the supreme authority in world literature; b) the Chinese official media applied the "Rise of China" as the main message, and the "Fame Follows Merits" as a subsidiary message in constructing its mainstream rhetoric--both of which were ideas sanctioned by nationalism and moralism; c) Chinese netizens in civil online forums and official media shared the same value orientations, but presented two opposite fantasy types; d) the overseas Chinese forums presented "Communist Dictatorship," "Oriental Empire," and criticisms of Orientalism, which were missing in both official and Internet discourses in China.
- Subjects
CHINA; MASS media; MO Yan, 1955-; SYMBOLIC convergence theory (Communication); NATIONALISM; PRAGMATISM; AWARDS
- Publication
China Media Research, 2017, Vol 13, Issue 2, p23
- ISSN
1556-889X
- Publication type
Article