News reports and media systems : a comparative study of Norwegian and Chinese Press coverage of Norwegian Prime Minister's state visit to China

Abstract

I have conducted an empirical study of the Norwegian and the Chinese newspaper coverage of the Norwegian Prime Minister's state visit to China in order to compare the two media systems in these two countries. The empirical data consist of eighty news articles that were published in two Norwegian and two Chinese newspapers in the month of November 1995. A combination of quantitative and qualitative content analysis has been carried out in order to register both the quantitative and the qualitative textual differences of these news texts. However, methodologically, the overwhelming emphasis has been placed upon the discourse analysis, which is especially appropriate for the purpose of my study. Significant differences have been discovered between the two sets of newspapers, and these textual differences are accounted for in terms of media system diversity as well as cultural diversity in the two countries.