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Financially, because the Chinese Communist press is not organized on a market economy basis, it cannot support itself by advertising revenue or financial sponsorships." Its tenure has to depend on the will of the leadership. Shue (1981) found that such was the case where some local papers remained alive while others closed down.
These factors maintain the media as mere mouthpieces of the Party and the government. As instruments of the leadership, what the media present would be the materials that the government or the mainstream leaders intend to; what the media present would be vital to the politics of governance.
Under tight control of the Communist Party Government, Chinese mass media have a high degree of homogeneity; in the outlook of their workers, in the events and the comments they present. As a result, they can be taken as a collective unit, they can be taken as the mouthpiece, it makes sense to postulate that the things the mass media say would be what the Government tries to convey. If face behaviour is detected in the verbal contents of the mass media, then it can be attributed as belonging to the Government in the interest of the Government's face. It is this aspect of face behaviour which the present paper attempts to focus on. To illustrate the place of mass media in this context, we may use the optical theory again.
Referring back to the diagram as presented in Figure 3, the work of the mass media can be seen as the implementation of face strategies (note that "mass media" is bracketed under face strategy). They are the weapons to realize the tentative effects of face behaviour in the interest of their owners. Some strategies may be directed to enhance face. Some others to save and the rest to lose the face of others in order to bring positive effects to the face of the owners.
As shown in the diagram, an analysis of mass media contents would be an analysis of the depictions and strategies, instead of the effects. It is the image(s) between the lens and the mirror that such an analysis could be studied (c.f. Figure 3). It is the external, the manifest aspects and presentations, which are visible in the mass media, not so much the effects of them which are external to the contents of the mass media.
A final remark is that the Party and the Government in the PRC could hardly be discerned from one another under the present political system.
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Financially, because the Chinese Communist press is not organized on a market economy basis, it cannot support itself by advertising revenue or financial sponsorships." Its tenure has to depend on the will of the leadership. Shue (1981) found that such was the case where some local papers remained alive while others closed down.
These factors maintain the media as mere mouthpieces of the Party and the govemment. As instruments of the leadership, what the media present would be the materials that the government or the mainstream leaders intend to; what the media present would be vital to the politics of
governance.
Under tight control of the Communist Party Government, Chinese mass media have a high degree of homogeneity; in the outlook of their workers, in the events and the comments they present. As a result, they can be taken as a collective unit, they can be taken as the mouthpiece, it makes sense to postulate that the things the mass media say would be what the Government tries to convey. If face behaviour is detected in the verbal contents of the mass media, then it can be attributed as belonging to the Government in the interest of the Government's face. It is this aspect of face behaviour which the present paper attempts to focus on. To illustrate the place of mass media in this context, we may use the optical theory again.
Referring back to the diagram as presented in Figure 3, the work of the mass media can be seen as the implementation of face strategies (note that "mass media" is bracketed under face strategy). They are the weapons to realize the tentative effects of face behaviour in the interest of their owners. Some strategies may be directed to enhance face. Some others to save and the rest to lose the face of others in order to bring positive effects to the face of the owners,
As shown in the diagram, an analysis of mass media contents would be an analysis of the depictions and strategies, instead of the effects. It is the image(s) between the lens and the mirror that such an analysis could be studied (c.f. Figure 3). It is the external, the manifest aspects and presentations, which are visible in the mass media, not so much the effects of them which are external to the contents of the mass media
A final remark is that the Party and the Government in the PRC could hardly be discerned from one another under the present political system.
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