Media and Communication in the Chinese Diaspora: Rethinking Transnationalism by Wanning Sun & John Sinclair

Author:Wanning Sun & John Sinclair [Sun, Wanning & Sinclair, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: social science, Ethnic Studies, General, Media Studies, Regional Studies
ISBN: 9781317509462
Google: H-6PCgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2015-09-16T20:23:54.850866+00:00

Research methods

My research was conducted in the Netherlands in 2012. Both in-depth interviews and textual analyses were used. For the in-depth interviews, I was able to meet all editors-in-chief of the three newspapers, and extend the scope of my study by including founders and editors of past newspapers. I was also able to discuss with other journalists, writers, ex-workers, and community leaders associated with the industry. Most of them were active as organizers or members of charity- or clan-based associations within the migrant community, or as volunteers engaged in social clubs and community activities. Most importantly, they had access to media representation through their active participation in the community and the media industry. The founders and editors were asked about the background and general operation of their newspapers, their daily journalistic practices, their criteria for selecting topics to report, the prevalent forms of cooperation with official China news sources, and how they treat official news content before going into publication. All interviewees were asked questions concerning their cultural identity, personal life history, media consumption habits, and how they read official China news. Eleven of them were selected for reporting in this chapter (see Appendix for a list of interviewees).

The content of the three newspapers published between July 2011 and June 2012 was subjected to textual analysis. Two of the papers had websites from which soft information could be readily drawn. For the one without an online edition, I relied on copies I had collected or past issues provided by the editors. In total, I managed to analyze around fifty issues of the three newspapers for the discourse in their content. Discourse analyses are not concerned merely with underlying power relationships but also with how those power relationships influence and transform discursive practices (Fairclough 2010). For this perspective, I had to pay special attention to two sets of newspaper content, their discursive practices, and the power relationships between them. The first set consisted of news items and information provided by official China news sources. This included news that had been sourced from CNS, Xinhua, and the Chinese embassy, as well as items with identical photos and wording that were published in different newspapers at around the same time and which were assumed to be press releases or newsfeeds provided by official sources. The second set comprised items produced by newspapers’ editorial staff or local contributors. This included reports on local news and community activities, columns, features, and editorials that were mainly in the inner pages. An overview of my analysis is provided in the following three sections. First, I will discuss historical and contextual factors in the construction of hegemonic official discourses within the diasporic community. Second, I will discuss the ideologies underpinning dominant discourses by focusing on the relationship between the diasporic community and the China that these discourses depict. Finally, I will examine some alternative narratives as represented in the diasporic community, and see how that community recalls and understands its collective memory and identity.

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