A Comparative Study on Media Image Construction of Overseas Chinese Students in China and Western Media

Abstract

With the growing number of Chinese students studying abroad, their media representation has attracted increasing scholarly attention. Drawing on Appraisal Theory, this study examines how Western and Chinese media construct the image of overseas Chinese students through evaluative discourse. Based on a self-constructed corpus of 40 news reports published between 2012 and 2022 in major Chinese and Western newspapers, the study analyzes attitude resources, affect, judgement, and appreciation, using UAM Corpus Tool 3.3 and a mixed quantitative and qualitative approach. The findings reveal clear cross-media differences. Western media employ attitude resources more frequently, with a stronger tendency toward appreciation and negative, explicitly inscribed judgement, often framing overseas Chinese students in relation to vulnerability, abnormality, or moral suspicion. By contrast, Chinese media rely more heavily on positive and implicitly invoked judgement, particularly capacity and tenacity, constructing an image of overseas Chinese students as competent, diligent, and socially valuable. This study demonstrates how evaluative resources function as key linguistic mechanisms in shaping divergent media images and contributes to corpus-based cross-cultural media discourse research.