摘 要

近年来，由中国政府提出的“一带一路”政策对周边国家乃至全世界的政治，经济和外交都产生了重大影响，引发了热切关注。经调查，作者发现《经济学人》杂志长期对“一带一路”展开报道评论。本文将基于语料库语言学和多维分析方法来研究《经济学人》杂志中与“一带一路”相关的政治新闻的文体特征。通过筛选关键词，作者挑选出20篇《经济学人》杂志2015年至2016年期间与“一带一路”政策相关的文章，组成了自建政治新闻语料库，总词数共计21214；并从美国当代语料库官网所提供的样本数据中选取了2003年至2012年的杂志文本作为对照的语料，共计133499字。本文将从多功能和多维度的角度来比较两个语料库，找出其风格特征的异同。多维分析标记器（MAT）1.1和SPSS 22.0等软件将用于标记语言特征和分析数据。本研究旨在提供一种阅读和欣赏政治报道的方法，帮助读者更好地理解这种文体。

关键词：语料库；多维分析；政治新闻；经济学人；一带一路

Abstract

In recent years, the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by the Chinese government has exerted major impact on the politics, economy and diplomacy of neighboring countries and all over the world, which has drawn great attention. After investigation, the author finds that The Economist magazine has been publishing reports on the Belt and Road Initiative. The present thesis is an attempt to investigate the stylistic features of Political News on the Belt and Road Initiative in The Economist based on corpus and Biber's Multidimensional (MD) analysis. This study is based on the corpus of The Economist Political Reportage (CEPR), which consists of twenty articles related to the Belt and Road Initiative published in 2015 and 2016, with 21214 words. The corpus of magazine (CMAG) is to be employed to make a comparison to find similarities and differences of their stylistic features. Moreover, The Multidimensional Analysis Tagger (MAT)1.1 and SPSS 22.0 are to be used to help tag linguistic features and analyze the data. Therefore, this thesis aims to provide a method to read and appreciate political reportage and help readers understand this kind of reportage well.

Key Words: corpus study; multidimensional analysis; political reportage; The Economist；the Belt and Road Initiative

CONTENTS

1 Introduction1

1.1 Research Objectives1

1.2 Layout of the thesis2

2 Literature Review3

2.1 Previous Research on News Report3

2.2 Biber’s Analytical Framework4

2.3 Previous Studies Using the MD.00 Analysis6

3 Methodology8

3.1 Research Questions8

3.2 Self-compiled Corpus8

3.3 Research Instrument8

3.4 Research Procedures9

4 Result and Discussion10

4.1 Interpretation of Dimension Scores10

4.1.1 Involved versus Informational Production10

4.1.2 Narrative versus Non-Narrative Concerns11

4.1.3 Explicit versus Situation-Dependent Reference12

4.1.4 Overt Expression of Persuasion13

4.1.5 Abstract versus Non-Abstract Information14

4.2 Comparison of the two corpora15

5 Conclusion19

5.1 Major Findings19

5.2 Limitation 19

6 Reference 21

7 Appendix 23

8 Acknowledgement 27

A Multidimensional Analysis of Stylistic Features of Political News —— A case study of Political News on the Belt and Road Initiative in The Economist

1 Introduction

1.1 Research Objectives

Magazine, as a widely-spread medium, is a mirror of the society. It records the political events and international affair in the most direct and convenient way. The language of magazine precisely demonstrates the authentic use of language in the modern society. The Economist, famous for its poignant economic and political news, attracts people's attention as a matter of course.

With the rapid development of globalization, the information concerning China’s policy has exerted great influence over the world. The implement of the Belt and Road Initiative of Chinese government has reinforced the international communication with other countries. The political news reportage on the Belt and Road Initiative has begun to arouse more and more concerns from the readership of The Economist.