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A critical stylistic analysis of a report on the Tibet issue Mao Ye, University of Huddersfield, UK 1. Introduction. The focus of this article will be on a report that concerns the Tibet issue with regards to the basic argument of whether or not Tibet should be independent. Using the transitivity system and other tools of critical stylistics, my analysis explores how reports from the stance of Beijing and Tibet affect the reader’s point of view using ‘hidden’ ideologies. Even though there are explicit ideologies that one can immediately notice, this article illustrates less obvious instances of ideological consequences to explain what they are and how they work in news reports. 2. Data 2.1 Background The Tibet issue that occurred in 2008 regarding whether or not Tibet should be independent attracted my attention when I was reading the news on the BBC website. A report, entitled “Tibet Issue” (see Appendix), presents an interesting investigation with the question-answer format about this worldwide argument. The first half of the report is based on various official Chinese sources to outline Beijing’s stance on the Tibet issue including some influential newspapers, such as People’s Daily (the top Party’s press) and Xinhua News Agency (the top Party’s news press) in China. In contrast, the other half is based on information that Thubten Samphel, the Dalai Lama’s director of information, gave to the press. He outlined the exiled Tibetan government’s stance on the China-Tibet issue. One can notice even with a quick glance that the ideologies of both sides are explicit. Beijing believes that Tibet is part of China historically whereas Tibet believes that although they are now a part of China, they have not always been. In order to contrast the opposite point of view on the same issues, the news report set up the format of identical questions and relevant quotations as the answers from Chinese official sources and from the Dalai Lama’s director. This article deals with the first four questions in the report using critical discourse analysis tools revealing a number of implicit ideological consequences which are meant to support Beijing’s and Tibet’s opinions to convince readers what they read must be truthful and just. SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 1 2.2 Four Questions Question1: Is Tibet part of China? Beijing: For more than 700 years, the central government of China has continuously exercised sovereignty over Tibet, and Tibet has never been an independent state. No government of any country in the world has ever recognised Tibet as an independent state. (People's Daily, April 2008) Tibet: It is beyond dispute at various periods of its long history that Tibet came under differing degrees of foreign influence: the Mongols, the Gurkhas of Nepal, the Manchu emperors of China and the British rulers of India all played their parts. At other periods in the plateau's history, it was Tibet which exercised power and influence over its neighbours including China. It would be hard to find any state in the world today that has not been subjected to foreign domination or influence at some era in its history. In Tibet's case the degree and duration of foreign influence and interference was relatively limited. Question2: What was Tibet like before the Communists established control in 1951? Beijing: Even in the first half of the 20th Century, Tibet remained a society of feudal serfdom under a theocracy, one even darker and more backward than medieval Europe. The ecclesiastical and secular serf owners controlled the personal freedom of the serfs and slaves who made up more than 95% of the population of Tibet. By resorting to... extremely savage punishments, including gouging out eyes, cutting off ears, tongues, hands and feet, pulling out tendons, throwing people into rivers or off cliffs, they practiced cruel economic exploitation. (Xinhua News Agency, March 2008) Tibet: Traditional Tibetan society - like most of its Asian contemporaries - was backward and badly in need of reforms. However, it is completely wrong to use the word "feudal" from the perspective of medieval Europe to describe traditional Tibetan society. Tibet before the invasion, in fact, was far more egalitarian than most Asian countries of that time. Hugh Richardson, who spent a total of nine years in Tibet as Britain's last and independent India's first representative, wrote: ‘even communist writers have had to admit there was no great difference between rich and poor in [pre-1949] Tibet.’ Question3: What has happened since then? Beijing: Since its peaceful liberation in 1951, Tibet has undergone profound social changes, including democratic reform, reform and opening up, and has achieved remarkable social and economic progress. (China's Foreign Ministry Handbook, July 2007) Tibet: An internal Chinese military document states that from 1952 to 1958, the People's Liberation Army crushed 996 rebellions and killed over 10,000 Tibetans in the north-eastern region of Kanlho. Golog, another Amdo area, saw its population halved from an estimated 140,000 in 1956 to about 70,000 in 1964. Referring to this area, the late Panchen Lama [the SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 2 second most important figure in Tibetan Buddhism after the Dalai Lama] told Beijing's leaders: ‘if there was a film made on all the atrocities perpetrated in Qinghai Province, it would shock the viewers. In Golog area, many people were killed and their dead bodies rolled down the hill into a big ditch. The soldiers told the family members and relatives of the dead people that they should celebrate since the rebels had been wiped out. They were even forced to dance on the dead bodies.’ Question4: Who was behind a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, after which the Dalai Lama fled to India? Beijing: In face of the ever-growing demand of the people for democratic reform, some people in the upper ruling strata of Tibet, in order to preserve feudal serfdom and supported by imperialist forces, staged an armed rebellion all along the line on 10 March 1959 in an attempt to separate Tibet from China. (Xinhua News Agency, March 2008) Tibet: The '59 uprising against Chinese rule was a people's movement to resist all the changes the Chinese Communist Party were introducing in Tibet. In the 17 Point Agreement signed between Tibet and China in 1951, the Chinese Communist Party promised that in return for Tibet coming to the fold of motherland, China would not change Tibet's traditional social system or tamper with the powers of the Dalai Lama. Both these promises were not kept, and the introduction of collectivisation and other aspects of the social system in Tibet forced the Tibetans to rise up. 3. Methodology 3.1 Introduction As a necessary element in a clause, the verbal element, or predicator, plays an extremely important role in presenting information ‘on what is being done (actions), what is happening (event), or what simply is (states)’ (Jeffries 2009:58). In this article, the transitivity model of representing actions/events/state, is applied as the main focus for my analysis. Other linguistic aspects, namely assuming and implying, naming and describing, exemplifying and enumerating and hypothesising are used too to demonstrate the relevant ideological consequences within the text (Jeffries 2010). 3.2 Simpson (1993)’s Model of Transitivity Grammatically, the notion of transitivity summarises the distinction of a verb as to whether it is to be followed by an object or not. A verb followed by an object is seen as transitive and one not followed by an object as intransitive. Nevertheless, the description given above of transitivity is not completely accurate since in many cases a single verb might require more than one object and a single verb might contain the identities of both transitive and intransitive. Halliday’s (Halliday 2004:282-284) transitivity system presents the importance SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 3 of verb choice in a clause as Jeffries commented ‘one part of the Hallidayan model of language which has taken up by CDA analysts as useful for unearthing textual ideologies is his version of transitivity […] He saw verb choice as central to each clause, and as dictating many of the other choices that follow. This choice, he concludes, was partly based on the particular view of an event or action (or state) that the speaker/writer wished to convey.’ (Jeffries 2010:60). In this article, the model of transitivity I will apply to my analysis is Simpson’s later model (Simpson 1993) which is both clear and applicable. According to the kinds of process or state verbs that seem to be described, the transitivity model is encapsulated into four categories. Table1 below shows these details. Category Participants Sub-categories Material Actor, Goal Intention (MAI) Action Supervention (MAS) Processes Event (MAE) Verbalization Speaker, Verbiage, Processes Goal Mental Experiencer, Cognition (MC) Processes Experienced Reaction (MR) Perception (MP) Relational Intensive (RI) Processes Possessive (RP) Circumstantial (RC) Table 1. Simpson’s transitivity model (Adapted from Simpson 1993: 88-92) In the analysis, the verb choice of the answers from both Beijing and Tibet will be classified according to the table above. Identifying the property of these specific verbs, I will illustrate the linguistic effect of these choices then explain how the hidden messages work to enhance the ideological viewpoint to readers/hearers through these implicit approaches. SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 4 3.3 Other Linguistic Models On top of the transitivity model, there are other linguistic approaches to reveal how these implicit implications are conveyed to readers/hearers. This includes, namely, presupposition, nominalization, modality, negation, and exemplifying and enumerating. Presupposition is the most frequent instances observed in the news report apart from the instances of transitivity. Jeffries gives the definition ‘the term presupposition is used to refer to assumptions that are built-into the text, and though they are therefore sometimes seen as semantics, rather than pragmatic, they do remain rather elusive as they are not directly by the text, but are the background upon which it is built’(2009:60). The ideological effect of this would minimize the possibility of doubting the potential questions built-into the text by presuppositions. There are various cases in the new report that will be explored in detail, and the triggers of presupposition being used include the definite article in existential presupposition, cleft sentence, iterative words and comparative structure. I will demonstrate how these ideological messages embedded influence readers/hearers in relevant sections. The answers of question 4 from both Beijing and Tibet used nominalization to support their own points. Nominalization is similar to presupposition in a way that they both embed information in a sort of fixed form which makes difficult for further argument. The information embedded in these nominalized noun phrases as entities ideologically force readers/speakers to accept the specific point of view that speakers/writers want to convey without raising any doubts as if they were presented as act process. In the broad sense, modality concerns with a speaker’s ‘attitude towards’ or ‘opinion about’ (Simpson 1993: 46). Simpson summarizes four categories of modality. They are deontic modality, boulomaic modality, epistemic modality and perception modality (Simpson 1993: 51). In this news report, the instance of modality belongs to the category of epistemic modality. Simpson explains ‘...epistemic modality is concerned with the speaker’s confidence or lack of confidence in the truth of a proposition expressed’ (Simpson 1993: 48). I will give precise explanation later in the analysis. The significance of negation allows speakers/writers to create a non-existent world for various reasons. In the news report, in order to support Tibet’s stance, the negation is used to naturalize the foreign influence upon Tibet by creating an imagining world no country has receive no foreign influence. In one of the Beijing’s answers, a three-part list is used to enumerate the changes since liberation in 1952 in Tibet. The aspects of changing social establishment might not be included in a short three-part list but ‘three-part lists are frequently symbolic of completeness’ (Jefferies 2010: 70). I will explain further later in the analysis. 4. Analysis 4.1 Question1 Is Tibet part of China? SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 5 Beijing’s stance: Beijing would answer yes to this question as the fact that Tibet is part of China. The answer is short but straight to the point ‘for more than 700 years, the central government of China has continuously exercised sovereignty over Tibet, and Tibet has never been an independent state. No government of any country in the world has ever recognised Tibet as an independent state’. What interesting are the three choices of verbs, ‘has continuously exercised’, ‘has never been’ and ‘has ever recognised’. With ‘the central government of China’ as the Actor, the verbal phrase ‘has continuously exercised’ is an Intention process with the Goal ‘sovereignty over Tibet’. The result of doing this suggests that the act of ruling Tibet has been an intentional act by China for a long time rather than just by chance. This naturalises the positive answer and confirms its point that Tibet is part of China by presenting an active process. Looking at the negative perfect tense verbal phrase ‘has never been’ in the other coordinate clause of the first sentence, the use of an Intensive Relational process indicates that it is a statement without any further need for argument. In so doing, it conveys the point that Tibet, as part of China, is in fact not only now but also was, at least, over the last 700 years, which makes the statement difficult to challenge since it conveys certainty. The second sentence within this answer does the same job as the first clause with an MAI verb ‘recognise’. The ideological consequence of this process is the way that the intention of the Actor ‘no government of any country’ works with a negating structure to emphasise that not one country in the world has the intentional act to recognise Tibet as an independent state. It includes China in the collection of countries all over the world that do not recognize Tibet’s independence. This shows a much more powerful stance which is universal. It gives the message that China is not an isolated country who does not recognise the independence of Tibet but rather other countries in the world believe the same. By presenting the ideas in this way, Beijing highlights its point that Tibet is part of China with the semantic evidence which is explicit and has implicit ideological impact to strengthen its point in order to convince the reader/hearer. Tibet’s stance: With regards to the Tibetan response, the director presented opposite ideas to emphasise the point that Tibet is not a part of China. Modality, transitivity, and presupposition can be applied to uncover how implicit ideologies are conveyed, rather than just an exact yes or no answer. Thubten Samphel said ‘it is beyond dispute at various periods of its long history that Tibet came under different degrees of foreign influence: the Mongols, the Gurkhas of Nepal, the Manchu emperors of China and the British rulers of India all played their parts’. Using a strong epistemic modality, it shows the strength in its commitment (it is beyond dispute etc.) and makes ‘a firm case for the reality of the scenario it is putting forward’ (Jefferies 2009:198) Here he admitted that Tibet came under some influences in the past, but the influences from China is not significant at all. This is because the influence from China was SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 6 just, at most, a quarter of the rather limited foreign influence as ‘the Mongols, the Gurkhas of Nepal, the Manchu emperors of China and the British rulers of India all played their parts’. So, the ideological consequence of using a strong epistemic modality is to weaken the professed certainty in order to naturalise foreign influences which were supportive in Tibet’s case. By doing so, he claims that Tibet was not part of China by means of some mutual influence between them to emphasis the equality between them and lessening the hierarchy relation with China. Apart from the example of modality mentioned above, a couple of verb choices are interesting to note. The MAE verbal phrase ‘came under’ in the relative clause sets up Tibet as the Goal and the foreign influence as the Actor. This way, it puts Tibet in a position as a receiver of the foreign influence avoiding the intentional act. This seems to claim that Tibet did not like these influences but it happened anyway. Bearing that in mind, it seems to confirm that Tibet was influenced without any choice and Tibet would not come under these foreign influences if there was a choice. Therefore, the first part of his speech seems to sugar coat the historical truth of the existence of the foreign influence and minimise the relationship with China in the past to present his point that Tibet is not part of China. The second sentence states ‘At other periods in the plateau’s history, it was Tibet which exercised power and influence over its neighbours-including China.’ There are two ideological consequences within this sentence. The first being the structure ‘it was Tibet which exercised…’ as a cleft sentence which is a terminology in presupposition. A cleft sentence can be seen as a sentence that has been divided into two separate clauses with the focus being put on one constituent of the sentence. In the sentence showed above, the subject ‘Tibet’ has been emphasised to add focus on who exercised power and influence over its neighbours including China. It presupposes that what Tibet has done is true in a way of embedding a clause which is a process (a potentially open question) into a sentence with a RI verb to restrain the debate that might be against his point. The other ideological impact between the lines is the use of an MAI verb ‘exercise’ which has, interestingly, been used in Beijing’s answer as well. Presenting the act of influencing neighbours-including China by an MAI verb, it seems to intentionally put Tibet in a position of power, and in other words, claiming that Tibet was more powerful than neighbouring countries, specifically China as China was the only country mentioned as an example during that period of time in Tibetan long history. Therefore, the ideological impact sets up a view that Tibet was much more powerful than China. This reconfirms that Tibet was not part of China giving the potential reason that China was not ‘strong’ enough to be in charge. The following sentence works out with ideologies in negation. He said ‘it would be hard to find any state in the world today that has not been subjected to foreign domination or influence at some era in its history’. In this sentence, by using the negative verb phrase ‘has not been subjected to’ in the relative clause, it indicates that ‘at some era in its history’, any state in the world has been subjected to ‘foreign domination or influence’ in a way that ‘negative construction or lexical item sets up for the reader/listener a particular kind of regular opposition, by conjuring up not only the absence of an occurrence of a process but also a positive version in which the process occurs’ (Jefferies 2009:183). Thus it gives the impression that it is natural for Tibet to be influenced by foreign domination as every state in the world has undergone the same process during a certain period of time in the past. It SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 7 moves Tibet’s case into a general category in order to try to fade off the potentially further argument regarding this historical issue. The last sentence of this paragraph, ‘in Tibet’s case the degree and duration of foreign influence and interference was relatively limited ’, involves two ideological consequences on transitivity and presupposition. With the use of an RI verb, the sentence could simply be seen as ‘In Tibet’s case A was relatively limited’ which would suggest it is a statement without any doubt as the usual RI process indicates. The head noun (degree and duration) of the subject (A) is pre-modified with the definite article ‘the’ as the determiner. Its ideological presupposition could only be that he admitted the existence of this influence occurred in a way to show reader/hearer that he spoke honestly about the history rather than denying it. So, with the complement (relatively limited), it seems to frame a picture that a reliable person is telling the truth, nevertheless, the focus of the answer changes to the fact that the influence in Tibet was fairly limited. By presenting the ideas in these specific ways the strategy of indicating messages works well to lessen the focus of requiring the explicit simple answer to the question whether Tibet is part of China. He also illustrated to the reader/hearer the historical issues to convey his point that the foreign influence was inevitable in the process of any country’s development and thus the relation between China and Tibet is rather equal as the influence was mutual. Avoiding a definite answer, he set up a view to convince reader/hearer that Tibet was not part of China, at least historically, as well as to try to lead to a potential impression that Tibet should not be part of China now. 4.2 Question2 What was Tibet like before the Communists established control in 1951? Beijing’s stance: It is reasonable that Beijing needs evidence to prove the influence of the establishment of Communist control rather positive in Tibet. Thus, Beijing’s answer is likely frame a picture that Tibet was extremely backward before the establishment of Communist control in 1951 and the establishment greatly helped Tibet’s development. The first sentence of its answer is ‘even in the first half of the 20th Century, Tibet remained a society of feudal serfdom under a theocracy, one even darker and more backward than medieval Europe.’ In this sentence, on top of using a MAI verb, the striking ideological effect is the instances of presupposition. The triggers of logical presupposition being used here are the iterative word ‘remained’ and the comparative structure ‘one even darker and more backward than medieval Europe’. Similar to the other instance of an MAI verb I have mentioned above, it often results in conveying the ideology that the Actor has the intention of the act. In so doing, it suggests that Tibet as the Actor intended to ‘remain a society of feudal serfdom under a theocracy’ which can lower down the level of Tibet’s social development before 1951 and criticise Tibet as being at such low social level. As one of the triggers of logical presupposition, the iterative words work out the presupposition of some earlier or later occurrence. In this sentence, the SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 8 iterative word remained presupposes that, before the first half of the 20th century, Tibet had kept its society like that for a while, which, again, adds a more negative impression to demonstrate how backward Tibet was by the ideological consequence of the presupposition. The other trigger of logical presupposition I found here is the comparative structure, ‘where the basis of the comparison is presupposed’. (Jefferies 155:2009). Saying that ‘one even darker and more backward than medieval Europe’, this indicates that the society of Tibet was overwhelmingly awful since it was even worse than the situation of presupposition that the medieval Europe was dark and backward enough. Implying that Tibet’s society was even worse than medieval Europe, the time adverbial (even in the first half of the 20th century) doubles the strength of its emphasis of the statement that in such a modern world, Tibet, still kept an very undeveloped society system which can make the establishment of Communist control sensible and even beneficial. Therefore the ideological consequences of this answer do a good job to implant in the readers’ mind that no matter how far back we look on Tibetan society, it seems very backward and that was what Tibet tended to do before the establishment of Communists control. In doing so, it may direct to a potential agreement that the establishment of Communist control was necessary and for Tibet’s own good to the reader/hearer. Tibet’s stance: Coincidentally, the Tibetan stance to this question produces the similar effect, presupposition, as Beijing’s answer does. Opposite to Beijing’s answer, Tibet’s point of view draws the attention to the idea that, Tibet was a peaceful place before the establishment of Communist control. Based on this explicit point, a couple of ideologies are hidden but working to support the point implicitly. Comparative structures, triggers of presupposition, can be found in the first and third sentences in his speech respectively. The first sentence is ‘traditional Tibetan society –like most of its Asian contemporaries- was backward and badly in need of reform.’ Modifying the head noun society as a qualifier, the insertion ‘–like most of its Asian contemporaries-’ sets up a comparative structure which could be written as traditional Tibetan society was backward and badly in need of reforms as most of its Asian contemporaries. It presupposes that, at that time, most of its Asian contemporaries were backward and badly in need of reform. The ideological consequence I can see here is that by using the comparative structure to include other identities who share same features in order to minimise the focus that traditional Tibetan society was backward and badly in need of reform as it was a common situation for every Asian contemporary at that time. It would greatly naturalise the fact of Traditional Tibetan society being backward. The third sentence is ‘Tibet before invasion, in fact, was far more egalitarian than most Asian countries of that time.’ Sharing the same ideological trigger as in the first sentence, the ideological effect of this sentence is slightly different. By using the comparative structure ‘Tibet…was far more egalitarian than most Asian countries of that time’, it presupposes that most Asian countries of that time were already egalitarian to a certain extent. ‘Tibet before invasion’ here indicating before the establishment of Communist control, was at an extremely high degree of being egalitarian and was far better at that period of time compared to other SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 9 contemporaries. Thubten Samphel’s speech comments on the nature of the traditional Tibetan society in a positive approach altering the perspective of being backward to the comparative case to suggest that Tibetan society was superior before 1951 and the reform was redundant, even destructive. 4.3 Question 3 What has happened since then? Beijing’s stance: Beijing’s answer for this question is rather short and set in an official tone. Standing on the point that Tibet has become more developed since the establishment of Communist control, Beijing said that ‘since its peaceful liberation in 1951, Tibet had undergone profound social changes, including democratic reform, reform and opening up, and had achieved remarkable social and economic progress.’ Apart from the use of two MAI verbs (undergo and achieve) emphasising the intentional acts by the Actor Tibet, it is worth mentioning that the ideological consequences of the use of a two-part list. Two-part lists, connected with conjunctures such as and, imply that the most important or common items of a certain category are being presented in the list. In this compound sentence, sharing the same Actor ‘Tibet’, the two MAI verbs followed with different Goals set up a two-part list (Tibet has undergone..., and has achieved...) with an indication that the most important events that happened since the establishment of Communist control have been listed here. These acts were Tibet’s intention which supports the idea that the establishment was welcomed by Tibetans as it is an intentional act. Moreover, by doing so it avoids drawing possible attention to the aspects such as chaos caused by reform and refusal of the new society’s system to emphasise the rather beneficial aspects of the changes (profound social changes…, and had achieved remarkable social and economic progress) which had happened by then. Within the first clause of that sentence, the other instance of exemplifying by a three-part list (including democratic reform, reform and opening up) works out the hidden ideological consequence too. By the exemplifying mark including, it is explicit that the list is not complete and it is quite possible to extend the list where other items might fit in. Nevertheless, the certain type of list, three-part here, could generate the ideological effect that seems to conclude the whole topic by presenting part of the category. Jefferies comments ‘more significantly, perhaps, the ubiquitous three-part list seems to imply completeness, without being comprehensive, and often appears to supplant real content, particularly in contexts where positive image-making is seen as important’ (2009:112). Used as the post-modifier of the head noun changes, this list would imply to the reader/hearer that, since 1951, all the changes that happened in Tibet have been listed here, attempting to minimize the range of issues that might be against Beijing’s stance. In addition to the postmodifier profound social, the whole clause seems to claim that all the changes in Tibet were only positive reform and opening up. Presenting its answer like this, Beijing could be able to SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 10 convince the reader/hearer that the liberation was good for Tibet not only by the explicit speech but also by these ideological influences. Tibet’s stance: Compared with Beijing, Tibet’s answer is long and emotional. Holding the viewpoint that the establishment of communist control was a disaster for Tibet, Thubten Samphel said, ‘an internal Chinese military document states that from 1952 to 1958, the People’s Liberation Army crushed 996 rebellions and killed over 10,000 Tibetans in the north-eastern region of Kanlho’. I have highlighted these three verbs used in this sentence at levels of main clause and subordinating clauses. The main verb (states) with the Actor (an internal Chinese military document) can be seen as Event Process which stops further debate towrads the Goal, a compound clause, which is the main complain of this sentence. In this compound clause, following the Actor (the People’s Liberation Army), the two compound verbs (crushed and killed) can be seen as Intention Processes with the Goals (996 rebellions and over 10,000 Tibetans). The result of doing so is to enhance the effect that the cruel pictures the reader/hearer could imagine and that the People’s Liberation Army intended to commit a massacre in Tibet after the establishment. It seems to create the vivid scenes that the People’s Liberation Army enjoyed beating Tibetans without any humane empathy since the use of the Intentional Process verbs. Additionally, these two acts are at the subordinating level which makes it difficult to argue with the Event Process verb ‘state’ in the main clause at a higher hierarchy level. Apart from the explicit speech about the slaughter, this sentence seems to make a statement which can heighten the shock to the reader/hearer with cruelness to prove that the establishment of Communism were nothing but terrible for Tibet. 4.4 Question4 Who was behind a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, after which the Dalai Lama fled to India? Beijing Stance: In terms of this historical issue, Beijing points out the people’s demand of democratic reform and makes the explicit assertion that the uprising against Chinese rule was just an excuse to separate Tibet from China. The long simple sentence is ‘in face of the ever-growing demand of the people for democratic reform, some people in the upper ruling strata of Tibet, in order to preserve feudal serfdom and supported by imperialist forces, staged an armed rebellion all along the line on 10 March 1959 in an attempt to separate Tibet from China.’ In this simple sentence, the rather long noun phrases, which include modifiers and the head nouns, generate the ideological consequences by packaging up information by use of nominals. Jefferies comments on nominal ‘as a result of the normal structure of English SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 11 clauses, nominals are less susceptible to debate or question than other clausal elements, particular the verbal element. In other words, the nominal part of English clauses and sentences are ‘’packaging up’’ something that is named by that nominal element, and the recipient is not encouraged by such a structure to question the relationship between the parts of that structure.’ (30:2009). Let us take a close look at these noun phrases. The adverbial of the sentence is consisted of a prepositional phrase ‘in face of’ and a noun phrase ‘the ever-growing demand of the people for democratic reform’ that packaged up at least two processes which can be seen as open questions. The pre-modifier ‘the evergrowing’ could be replaced with an act written as ‘the demand is ever-growing.’ or a question as ‘is the demand ever-growing?’. The post-modifier ‘of the people for democratic reform’ also can be rewritten as ‘the people demand for democratic reform.’ or ‘do the people demand for democratic reform?’. Instead of presenting the act processes, the long noun phrase avoids the potential argument. By modification, it makes presupposition in order to convince the reader/hearer that what is illustrated here is true too. Again the use of the definite article the in the pre-modifier creates an existential presupposition that presupposes the existence of the ever-growing demand rather than using indefinite article which does not introduce existential presupposition but implies a general situation. By doing so, the noun phrase works effectively to make the speech less sceptical and to move the focus to the proposition of the Adverbial as the reason for the uprising against China in1959. On top of the ideological effect of the pre-modifier, the lengthy post-modifier of the subject ‘some people’ contributes to offer some hidden messages too. The long postmodifier is ‘in the upper ruling strata of Tibet, in order to preserve feudal serfdom supported by imperialist forces’. Within the first prepositional phrase, the noun phrase, where the head noun (strata) is pre-modified by determiner (the) and adjective phrase (upper ruling) and post-modified by the prepositional phrase (of Tibet). By using a definite article as a determiner, it presupposes the existence of the upper ruling strata in Tibet to support later complaints. Including an infinitive verb clause (to preserve feudal serfdom) in the second post-modifier as a prepositional phrase nominalises a process which could present as a question with verb element. In order to restrain the potential argument it is performed as a nominal entity to post-modify the head noun. The third post-modifier, an infinitive verb clause, again, nominalises the potential question of whether the people were ‘supported by imperialist forces’ into a less sceptical nominal post-modification. By doing so, the information of the three ideologies are packaged up into the post-modifier of the head noun ‘people’ and it is not easy to question these ideologies since the distinctions between entities and processes are less clear. Similarly, the noun phrase determines the object (rebellion) also packages up two ideas and alters their attention to the proposition which could be open to discuss. These messages are that the rebellion was armed and the rebellion was an attempt to separate Tibet from China. In other words, it also presupposes that the two issues are true. Without the various modifiers, the basic structure of the sentence is rather simple as ‘in face of demand, people staged rebellion.’ As the only process (staged) we can see in the sentence, the questions might arise from that are rather limited such as the arguments that if people staged rebellion and if the demand was the reason for people to stage rebellion. Imagine all these ideologies in the nominal form in this answer were set SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 12 out as processes, the reliability of would be much weaker as too much uncertainty available for further argument. Tibet’s stance: Thubten Samphel made comments on the issues that the introduction of Chinese Communist Party and China’s breaking of promises caused the uprising in Tibet. But my focus is on the first sentence where the linguistic approaches used to produce ideological effects. He said ‘The 59’ uprising against Chinese rule was a people’s movement to resist all the changes the Chinese Communist Party were introducing in Tibet.’ In this sentence, the first noun phrases performed as the Subject/Actor does not introduce any implicit ideology as the information being packaged up is just a historical event. But the second noun phrase, the Object/Goal, consisted of a head noun with two modifiers, generates an implicit ideological consequence to minimize the possibility of arising potential debates as shown below by using nominal element. The pre-modification ‘people’s’ could be questioned as ‘Was it a people’s movement?’ The post-modification ‘to resist all the changes the Chinese Communist Party were introducing in Tibet’ as ‘Was the movement to resist all the changes the Chinese Communist Party were introducing in Tibet?’ On top of this, by the use of the Intentional Relation verb was as the predicate, it is very likely for a reader/hearer to jump to the conclusion that the proposition of this complex sentence is reliable since all the chances of debate have been minimised by these implicit ideological consequences. Further more the only part one might doubt is the process ‘was’, or ‘was not’, but the nominal part can be definitely believed. So, at the beginning of the speech, the director has successfully set up the positive picture which is his claim that the introduction of Communist control is the reason for the uprising which he called the ‘people’s movement’. 5. Conclusion So far, I have analysed the answers of the first four questions with various CDA tools. My analysis reveals how implicit ideological consequence might lead reader/hearer to make certain conclusions that could support the speaker’s point of view in news reports. With regards to the cases I have presented in this article, I believe that I can prove that the special ways of writing can work out implicit impact beyond the text to convey its ‘hidden’ ideas even in the case that the data of both of stances are not from native speakers. Using similar methodology with similar approaches it is possible that others may come to a different analysis of the text from a different point of view. What has been presented here is based on my own understanding of the text and theories. However, with the CDA approaches that I used I can be sure that my analysis can be accepted as valid even though my own judgments may differ from others. Therefore, I think that my analysis can show how CDA approaches SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 13 work to understand news reports is not only applicable but very effective in helping to provide a different insight that may not be immediately noticeable to not only a native speaker but also those who read it as second language. REFERENCES Halliday, M. A. K. (2004) An Introduction to Functional Grammar. 3rd edition. London: Arnold Jeffries, L. (2010) Critical Stylistics: The Power of English. Basingstoke: Palgrave Simpson, P.(2004) Stylistics. London: Routledge Simpson, P.(1993) Language, Ideology and Point of View. London: Routledge The Tibet issue Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7411011.stm> [Accessed 26th March 2009] SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 14 APPENDIX The Tibet Issue (excluding the first four questions) As the Dalai Lama visits Britain, the BBC outlines Beijing's stance on Tibet, based on various official Chinese sources. Who was responsible for the recent unrest in Tibet? “We now possess sufficient evidence to prove that the Lhasa incident is part of the 'Tibetan people's uprising movement' organised by the Dalai clique. Its purpose is to create crisis in China by staging co-ordinated sabotage activities in Tibet. 'Tibet Independence' separatist forces led by the Dalai Lama takes the 2008 Beijing Olympics as their last straw to realise ‘Tibetan independence’.” (China's Ministry of Public Security press release, April 2008) “The Dalai Lama keeps talking about a peaceful way. However, solid facts prove that his much-vaunted 'middle way' policy and 'peaceful demonstrations' are blatant lies fabricated by the Dalai himself and the Dalai clique.” (China's Ministry of Public Security press release, April 2008) What does the Chinese government think about reports by the Western media about the recent events in Tibet? “It is unfortunate that a few Western media outlets, including some from the United States, are ignorant of the obvious truths and are basing their reports on distorted facts and unfounded claims.” (Zhang Yun, Chinese consul general for Los Angeles, Xinhua, April 2008) As the Dalai Lama visits Britain, his director of information, Thubten Samphel, outlines the Tibetan government-in-exile's stance on the China-Tibet issue. Who was responsible for the recent unrest in Tibet? “In the early 1980s, a liberal policy was introduced in Tibet. This policy dismantled collectivisation and there were plans to withdraw 85% of the Chinese cadres working in the Tibet Autonomous Region. This policy was aimed at letting Tibetans govern themselves. SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 15 “However, in 1994, all these liberal measures were withdrawn and a new policy called ‘grasping with both hands’ was implemented in Tibet. This policy continued Tibet's economic development while reimposing political repression targeted at undermining Tibetan culture and Tibetan Buddhism. The recent widespread protests in Tibet are Tibetans' resistance to this hardline policy.” What does the Tibetan government-in-exile think about reports by the Western media about the recent events in Tibet? “The Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) thinks that the international media coverage about the recent events in Tibet is the most extensive. The media reports were, by and large fair, accurate and balanced.” SRC Working Papers 2: 1-16 © Mao Ye 2012 16