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Face Behaviour And Verbal Mass Media Contents
It can also be seen that many of the strategies mentioned in the previous section can be verbal ones (the entire list of Modigliani's facework index and Strategy Nos. One to Five, and Eight in Berk's case). This point seems specially pertinent in the case of China. The view that Chinese people are particularly concerned with face may be attributed to the Chinese language. There are numerous expressions that apply the figurative meanings of the characters "mian" and "lian" (see Note 5). As such, it may be 'a rich source of verbal data for the study of face behaviour' (Ho, 1980: 30), and there is also high hope in spotting some face strategies being in use. This unique feature of the Chinese language and the nature of contemporary Chinese Communist mass media suggest that the concept of face may be examined as well by delving into the verbal content of mass communication." And this is precisely the reasoning behind the present study.
In the events reported in the mass media, we may analyse face behaviour, if any, of the incumbents through the depicted actions they undertake and through the words and reasoning they apply as quoted by media workers. More so, media workers, as a class in themselves, may have face behaviour in their own right. This may be shown in their treatment of news. If the homogeneity among media workers is high, there is strong ground to treat them as a collectivity, and as a collective mouthpiece or scribe for their boss(es). This seems to be the case in the Peoples' Republic of China (PRC).
In Communist China, the mass media can be regarded as the verbal instruments of the ruling regime. The media as "mouthpieces" of the Party, the country and the people have been reiterated time and again but the concern of this pronouncement is still centre upon the Party or the Party Government. In order for the media to serve as mouthpieces of the Party and the Government, structurally, the Party Government has devised a comprehensive and encompassing system of communications strictly under its control.
Nationwide media are under the supervision of the Department of Propaganda which is directly controlled by the Party's Central Committee. Provincial media, on the other hand, are monitored through the Party's provincial committees. The newspaper industry, for example, is said to have developed into a multi-layer, multifarious and multi-lingual socialist