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Abstract： By means of Critical Discourse Analysis （CDA）， this paper conducts an empirical and comparative study of the hidden ideologies of the English economic news reports of Google’s Pullout of China covered by five prestigious newspapers： China Daily， Washington Post， New York Times， Guardian， and Telegraph. The results indicate that economic news reports are not utterly objective but are woven with a certain ideology. What’s more， ideological stance is a determinant in reporters’ choices of words and expressions.
Key words： Critical Discourse Analysis（CDA）； English economic news reports； Google’s Pullout of China
基金项目：西南林业大学《语言学概论》重点课程建设（2009～2011）基金之阶段性成果
1 Introduction
Discourse is “a general tem for examples of language use， i.e. language which has been produced as the result of an act of communication” . Discourse analysis deals with how the choice of articles， pronouns and tenses affects the structure of the discourse and the relationship between utterances. In recent years， news discourse has caught much attention from the advocates of Critical Discourse Analysis. According to Fowler， a forerunner in Critical Linguistics， “anything that is said or written about the world is articulated from a particular ideological position.” Critical linguists’ main task is to analyze how underlying ideologies and values are embedded in linguistic usage. The focus of CDA on news reports is to critically examine the diction of news reports. Foucault argues that “As a pre-eminent manifestation of the socially constructive ideology， language becomes the primary instrument through which ideology is transmitted， enacted and reproduced.” Therefore， it can be said that only when the language is analyzed in a critical way can the hidden ideological assumptions be unmasked and uncovered. No wonder Critical Linguists claim that since language is a byproduct of social practice done by human beings， it is inevitably for language to be tinged with the particular values and ideology shared by certain group of people living in a certain state of society.
Economic news reports， like any other genres of news reports， may be subtly ideological invested. In Signs and Wonders： Interpreting the Economy through Television， Richardson focuses on representations of the economy through television， and analyzes a piece of BBC news broadcast on the British economy at that time. His research aims at exploring the responses of the audience to the news items， such as what they recall from the screening， and how their comprehension of news information in the text is influenced by textual form. Unfortunately， news reports have not been studied much either at home or abroad in terms of critical discourse analysis， then this paper decides to make a tentative research on English economic news by using the theories of CDA as guidance. For the sake of better understanding of the relationship between economic reports and the hidden ideologies， this paper takes the economic event of Google’s pullout of China as a case study， and deliberately picks out six pieces of economic news reports from five prestigious newspapers at home and abroad： China Daily， New York Times， Washington Post， Guardian and Telegraph. Google， a prominent search engine leader headquartered in California， came to China in the year of 2006； However， 4 years later， on January 12th， 2010， Google， announced in the official blog that it was considering to leave Mainland China for Hong Kong. This was such a shocking statement that stirred great concern from the whole world. The objective of the research is mainly to prove that news reports are not considered to be objective， impartial or unambiguous； on the contrary， they are biased and ideologically invested.
2 Theoretical Foundations and Analytic Tools
This research is to be done mainly based on two theoretical foundations： the Three-Dimensional Framework proposed by Fairclough and Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar. According to Fairclough， every instance of discourse is regarded as a communicative event consisting of three dimensions： text， discursive practice and social practice. Accordingly， Fairclough develops three stages of CDA： description， interpretation and explanation. Fairclough argues that all the three stages are interconnected， each serving a particular purpose and aiming at uncovering the ideologies hidden in the discourse. Description is the first stage that is concerned with the formal properties of the text， such as properties of vocabulary and textual structure， of which the text is the central object； interpretation is concerned with the relationship between text and interaction， regarding the text as a resource in the process of interpretation.； explanation deals with the relationship between interaction and social context. The relationship among these three stages is represented in Fig. 1.
Fig.1： Discourse as text， interaction and context
Systemic-Functional Grammar （SFG） proposed by M.A.K Halliday is a very effective functional linguistic approach， which has exerted great influence on various linguistic branches， such as language teaching， sociolinguistics， stylistics， machine translation and discourse analysis. SFG is a “sociologically oriented functional linguistic approach and one of the most influential linguistic theories in the 20th century” According to SFG， a language system has three main metafunctions： ideational metafunction serves to express our experience， both of the external world and of the inner world of our own consciousness； ideational metafunction is mainly realized through the transitivity system and transformation； interpersonal metafunction refers to the relationship between the speaker and the hearer and it is mainly realized through mood and modality； textual metafunction refers to the fact that language has mechanisms to make any stretch of spoken or written discourse into a coherent and unified text. This research selects lexical choice and discourse representation as analytic tools to uncover the relationship between economic news reports and the hidden ideology. According to Fowler， vocabulary is an internal part of reproduction of ideology proposition. And SFG also regards lexis as a fundamental classification device to realize our experience of the world. Discourse representation is closely associated with interpersonal metafunction and the analysis of it is helpful in the discursive practice. Just as George Gordon Byron in his master piece Don Juan holds that“words are things， and a small drop of ink. Falling like dew upon a thought， produces that which makes thousands， perhaps millions， think”， so the study of discourse representation and how the authors transmit their own idea through those forms are quite important.
3 A Case Study of the News Reports of Google’s Pullout of China
The moment the news of Google’s planning to pull out of China came out， major media both at home and abroad rushed to report this explosive economic event in succession， trying to probe into the complicated reason for Google to give up such a lucrative market in China. Taking into account the influence of major domestic and foreign newspapers， this research collects sample reports from Washington Post， New York Times， Guardian， Telegraph， and China Daily. A brief survey of the samples indicates that western media gave much more attention to Google’s withdrawal from China， for western coverage of the news reports surpasses that of the reports given by China Daily in both length and quantity.
a） Contrast of headlines
Headline is an indispensable part of a written material. A good headline is the soul of an article， for it encompasses maximum information in a minimum number of words. Therefore， the diction in a headline is deliberately chosen so as to maximize the effect of the news reports. Hence， analyzing the headlines may help to reveal the intention of the reporters to a certain extent （Table 1）
Table 1： Sample headlines of the news reports of Google’s pullout of China
Sample 1 adopts the word “threaten”， implying that the event is quite serious and creating an unusual sense of uneasiness among readers. Sample 1 tries to tell the readers about the trigger for Google’s decision， namely， the attack on activists’ email. From this headline， readers may suspect that Google’s alleged email attack must be related to China， otherwise Google would not leave China in haste. Western countries， especially those holding a hostile attitude toward China， often employ the expression —“activists” instead of “separatists” to refer to those involved in the activities aiming at separating China， which is absolutely unacceptable in the eyes of any patriotic Chinese. Similar to Sample 1， Sample 2 also regards Google’s treatment in China as so intolerable that it determined to leave China. The word “exit” is more formal than “leave”， though carrying a similar meaning. Another explicit difference between Sample 1 and Sample 2 lies in that Sample 1 puts the reason in the latter part， while Sample 2 mentions it in the beginning to get it emphasized. Compared with American counterparts， Guardian （Sample 3） adopts a relatively neutral perspective by impressing the readers with the words “challenge” and “censorship”. The word “challenge” indicates that Google is unsatisfied with the current censorship implemented in China. Hence， readers may get an idea that Google has some problems with China’s censorship and may have done something illegal that violated China’s censorship over the Internet. Though Telegraph （Sample 4） doesn’t produce the source of the conflict between Google and China， yet it can also evoke readers’ curiosity， stimulating them to seek the reasons and imagine the possible influence this event would exert on Google. Sample 5 and sample 6 are both derived from China Daily with the publishing dates of Jan.14 and Mar.22 respectively. The report published earlier （Sample 5） is entitled “Google Pullout Threat ‘A Pressure Tactic’ ”. Sample 5 also contains the word “threat”， which indicates that Google’s behavior is not reasonable， but used as a means to intimidate and exert pressure on the Chinese government. China Daily readers who leaf through the headline will probably have the feeling that Google is unwilling to maintain a healthy cooperative relationship with Chinese government， but intends to impose stress on it so as to achieve its goal， which of course is unacceptable by the Chinese government. Two months later after the news of Google’s pullout got around， China Daily published another report （Sample 6） entitled “The Biggest Loser”. And at this time， the headline is pervaded with a note of showing contempt to and gaining a sense of victory over Google. The headline indicates that in the process of Google’s opposing against the Chinese government in censorship， Google is the biggest loser， who has suffered and will continue suffering a tremendous loss once it abandons this huge market； and in the meanwhile， other foreign search engines and China’s native search engine， Baidu， will take the place of Google and hence occupy more and more market shares. b） Contrast of some representative words in the main body of the news reports
Following is Table 2 which contains some samples of the main body of the news reports covered by the leading newspapers in the world.
Table 2： Samples of the main body of the news reports covered by the leading newspapers
The first four samples （Samples 1-4） are taken from abroad， i.e.， the UK and the US； through the choices of certain words， it is not difficult for one to detect their prejudice and hostility toward China： they employ the expressions such as “human rights groups”， “Human Rights Watch” or “pro-democracy protests” to refer to those who are engaged in activities aiming at separating China， destroying the current unity and damaging the friendly relationship between Han people and 55 ethnic groups. From the adoption of these words， it can be seen that these western major media were showing their undue sympathy and support toward the Chinese separatists and target China for the disgraceful cyber attack even though the allegation hasn’t been confirmed yet. And therefore， the objectiveness of these economic reports is quite doubtful. Compared with the first four economic news reports coming from western major newspapers， China Daily is much more neutral. In Sample 5 and Sample 6， there are no expressions like “human rights activists”， instead， there are expressions like “strategy” and “challenge the sovereignty”， which indicate that in the eyes of the Chinese government， Google’s move is nothing but a “political trick”， another strategy it employs to press the Chinese government into giving its search engine no restriction across the border. This demand is totally unacceptable to China and any other nations in the world， for every nation has the right to protect its core interests from being offended， and demand that foreign enterprises should comply with the local regulations. To sum up， China Daily and other four western newspapers choose different words to express their standpoint toward Google’s pullout of China， from which one can detect distinctly different attitudes towards Google’s statement. It is noticeable that on the one hand， western newspapers wear a pair of colored glasses to watch this event， accusing China of the malicious cyber attack with no sufficient evidence； by contrast， China Daily， as the most authoritative English newspaper， defends firmly the legal rights and interests of the country， and takes a more neutral view upon this event. c） Contrast of social context
Fairclough argues that every instance of language use can be viewed as a social practice. If we want to detect the ideology invested in the discourse， it would be necessary to investigate the wider context to which the communicative event belongs. It should be pointed out that so far the final answer to the real cause why Google pulled out of China hasn’t come out yet. Therefore， one cannot assert that Google’s alleged malicious cyber attack originated from China， nor can one exclude the assumption that Google’s pullout was due to its failure to conquer the huge Chinese market.
Throughout the event， Google reiterated that the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists had been attacked by hackers from China， and China stifled the freedom of speech on the cyber space. Since Google stated blatantly that it was suppressed by the Chinese censorship regulations and was not allowed to disseminate any forbidden sensitive political information， then western countries such as the UK and the US grasped this golden opportunity， by means of news reports， to denounce China on her human rights problems and， in the long run， to stain China’s image and lower China’s international fame. There is no denying that China has her own human rights problems， but this issue is universal and also exists in many other countries including the UK and the US. Furthermore， it shouldn’t be overlooked that each country’s human rights problem is specific and therefore it is unreasonable to judge and interfere with other country’s human rights problem with the standard only applicable to a certain country. Different countries have different national situations and the human rights problems can only be tackled by the local people. China is a large multiethnic country with a long history. For her， solving the human rights problems satisfactorily is really a time-consuming undertaking， which needs the great efforts of many generations. Therefore， the process for coping with China’s human rights problem is destined to be a long one， but so long as China is constantly making progress， this problem will be eradicated in the days to come. Just as the saying goes “Since in Rome， do as Romans do”， then it is a must for Google to abide by Chinese legislation and there is nothing wrong for the Chinese government to take corresponding measures to curb any illegal behaviors conducted by a foreign company. Google had no right to challenge China’s legislation， and its pullout of China would bring about little negative impact on the life of Chinese citizens， after all， other foreign search engines may pour into China and what’s more， the native search engine Baidu will get an opportunity to grow more and more powerful. The final loser is definitely none other than Google itself. 4 Concluding Remarks
This research has conducted a detailed analysis of sample English economic news reports from a critical perspective. By applying the basic theory of Fairclough’s Three-Dimensional Framework and analytical methods in Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar， this paper arrives at the following conclusions. First， Language is a byproduct of social practice； it reflects certain values of society in whatever is represented. So is the language in news discourses， which are inevitably laden with some values and ideological stance， rather than a pure representation of “facts”， Economic news reports are far from objective or impartial； rather， they reflect the reporters’ standpoints and ideological stances. In the case of Google’s pullout of China， western major newspapers （Washington Post， New York Times， Guardian， Telegraph） report it with the quotation of some anti-China sources， which is out of ulterior motive to damage China’s image. Secondly， reports are made mainly through deliberate lexical choice in line with the country’s own values and ideologies. Thirdly， the formation of any ideology cannot leave the social context. On many occasions， the ideology is reflected and influenced by the words and actions of the government. And the publicity function of mass media （e.g. newspapers） can help wield a huge influence on common people. In a word， on the one hand， ideology can be disseminated through non-literary language used in the mass media； on the other hand， language applied in the mass media can exert impact on the formation and change of a certain ideology. And thus readers’ critical thinking and awareness should be enhanced. Only when people read between the lines can they really understand how the news language is shaped by the ideology held in society.
References
[1]Deng Yanchang & Liu Runqing. Language and Culture [M].Beijing： Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press， 1989.
[2] Fairclough， N. Language and Power [M]. London： Longman， 1989.
[3]Fairclough， N. Critical Language Awareness [M]. Longman Group UK Limited， 1992
[4] Foucault， M. The Archaeology of Knowledge [M]. London： Tavistock Publication， 1972.
[5]Fowler， R. Language in the News： Discourse and Ideology in the Press [M].London： Routledge， 1991.
[6] Halliday， M. A. K. Explorations in the Functions of Language [M]. London： Edward Arnold， 1973.
[7]Hu Zhuanglin & Jiang， Wangqi. Linguistics： An Advanced Course Book [M]. Beijing： Beijing University Press， 2002.
[8] Richards， J. C& J. Platt & H. Platt. Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics [M]. Beijing： Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press， 2000： 138.
[9] Richardson， K. Signs and Wonders： Interpreting the Economy through Television[A].In A. Bell & P. Garrett （eds.） Approaches to Media Discourse[C]. Oxford： Blackwell Publishers Ltd.， 1998. 220-289.
Key words： Critical Discourse Analysis（CDA）； English economic news reports； Google’s Pullout of China
基金项目：西南林业大学《语言学概论》重点课程建设（2009～2011）基金之阶段性成果
1 Introduction
Discourse is “a general tem for examples of language use， i.e. language which has been produced as the result of an act of communication” . Discourse analysis deals with how the choice of articles， pronouns and tenses affects the structure of the discourse and the relationship between utterances. In recent years， news discourse has caught much attention from the advocates of Critical Discourse Analysis. According to Fowler， a forerunner in Critical Linguistics， “anything that is said or written about the world is articulated from a particular ideological position.” Critical linguists’ main task is to analyze how underlying ideologies and values are embedded in linguistic usage. The focus of CDA on news reports is to critically examine the diction of news reports. Foucault argues that “As a pre-eminent manifestation of the socially constructive ideology， language becomes the primary instrument through which ideology is transmitted， enacted and reproduced.” Therefore， it can be said that only when the language is analyzed in a critical way can the hidden ideological assumptions be unmasked and uncovered. No wonder Critical Linguists claim that since language is a byproduct of social practice done by human beings， it is inevitably for language to be tinged with the particular values and ideology shared by certain group of people living in a certain state of society.
Economic news reports， like any other genres of news reports， may be subtly ideological invested. In Signs and Wonders： Interpreting the Economy through Television， Richardson focuses on representations of the economy through television， and analyzes a piece of BBC news broadcast on the British economy at that time. His research aims at exploring the responses of the audience to the news items， such as what they recall from the screening， and how their comprehension of news information in the text is influenced by textual form. Unfortunately， news reports have not been studied much either at home or abroad in terms of critical discourse analysis， then this paper decides to make a tentative research on English economic news by using the theories of CDA as guidance. For the sake of better understanding of the relationship between economic reports and the hidden ideologies， this paper takes the economic event of Google’s pullout of China as a case study， and deliberately picks out six pieces of economic news reports from five prestigious newspapers at home and abroad： China Daily， New York Times， Washington Post， Guardian and Telegraph. Google， a prominent search engine leader headquartered in California， came to China in the year of 2006； However， 4 years later， on January 12th， 2010， Google， announced in the official blog that it was considering to leave Mainland China for Hong Kong. This was such a shocking statement that stirred great concern from the whole world. The objective of the research is mainly to prove that news reports are not considered to be objective， impartial or unambiguous； on the contrary， they are biased and ideologically invested.
2 Theoretical Foundations and Analytic Tools
This research is to be done mainly based on two theoretical foundations： the Three-Dimensional Framework proposed by Fairclough and Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar. According to Fairclough， every instance of discourse is regarded as a communicative event consisting of three dimensions： text， discursive practice and social practice. Accordingly， Fairclough develops three stages of CDA： description， interpretation and explanation. Fairclough argues that all the three stages are interconnected， each serving a particular purpose and aiming at uncovering the ideologies hidden in the discourse. Description is the first stage that is concerned with the formal properties of the text， such as properties of vocabulary and textual structure， of which the text is the central object； interpretation is concerned with the relationship between text and interaction， regarding the text as a resource in the process of interpretation.； explanation deals with the relationship between interaction and social context. The relationship among these three stages is represented in Fig. 1.
Fig.1： Discourse as text， interaction and context
Systemic-Functional Grammar （SFG） proposed by M.A.K Halliday is a very effective functional linguistic approach， which has exerted great influence on various linguistic branches， such as language teaching， sociolinguistics， stylistics， machine translation and discourse analysis. SFG is a “sociologically oriented functional linguistic approach and one of the most influential linguistic theories in the 20th century” According to SFG， a language system has three main metafunctions： ideational metafunction serves to express our experience， both of the external world and of the inner world of our own consciousness； ideational metafunction is mainly realized through the transitivity system and transformation； interpersonal metafunction refers to the relationship between the speaker and the hearer and it is mainly realized through mood and modality； textual metafunction refers to the fact that language has mechanisms to make any stretch of spoken or written discourse into a coherent and unified text. This research selects lexical choice and discourse representation as analytic tools to uncover the relationship between economic news reports and the hidden ideology. According to Fowler， vocabulary is an internal part of reproduction of ideology proposition. And SFG also regards lexis as a fundamental classification device to realize our experience of the world. Discourse representation is closely associated with interpersonal metafunction and the analysis of it is helpful in the discursive practice. Just as George Gordon Byron in his master piece Don Juan holds that“words are things， and a small drop of ink. Falling like dew upon a thought， produces that which makes thousands， perhaps millions， think”， so the study of discourse representation and how the authors transmit their own idea through those forms are quite important.
3 A Case Study of the News Reports of Google’s Pullout of China
The moment the news of Google’s planning to pull out of China came out， major media both at home and abroad rushed to report this explosive economic event in succession， trying to probe into the complicated reason for Google to give up such a lucrative market in China. Taking into account the influence of major domestic and foreign newspapers， this research collects sample reports from Washington Post， New York Times， Guardian， Telegraph， and China Daily. A brief survey of the samples indicates that western media gave much more attention to Google’s withdrawal from China， for western coverage of the news reports surpasses that of the reports given by China Daily in both length and quantity.
a） Contrast of headlines
Headline is an indispensable part of a written material. A good headline is the soul of an article， for it encompasses maximum information in a minimum number of words. Therefore， the diction in a headline is deliberately chosen so as to maximize the effect of the news reports. Hence， analyzing the headlines may help to reveal the intention of the reporters to a certain extent （Table 1）
Table 1： Sample headlines of the news reports of Google’s pullout of China
Sample 1 adopts the word “threaten”， implying that the event is quite serious and creating an unusual sense of uneasiness among readers. Sample 1 tries to tell the readers about the trigger for Google’s decision， namely， the attack on activists’ email. From this headline， readers may suspect that Google’s alleged email attack must be related to China， otherwise Google would not leave China in haste. Western countries， especially those holding a hostile attitude toward China， often employ the expression —“activists” instead of “separatists” to refer to those involved in the activities aiming at separating China， which is absolutely unacceptable in the eyes of any patriotic Chinese. Similar to Sample 1， Sample 2 also regards Google’s treatment in China as so intolerable that it determined to leave China. The word “exit” is more formal than “leave”， though carrying a similar meaning. Another explicit difference between Sample 1 and Sample 2 lies in that Sample 1 puts the reason in the latter part， while Sample 2 mentions it in the beginning to get it emphasized. Compared with American counterparts， Guardian （Sample 3） adopts a relatively neutral perspective by impressing the readers with the words “challenge” and “censorship”. The word “challenge” indicates that Google is unsatisfied with the current censorship implemented in China. Hence， readers may get an idea that Google has some problems with China’s censorship and may have done something illegal that violated China’s censorship over the Internet. Though Telegraph （Sample 4） doesn’t produce the source of the conflict between Google and China， yet it can also evoke readers’ curiosity， stimulating them to seek the reasons and imagine the possible influence this event would exert on Google. Sample 5 and sample 6 are both derived from China Daily with the publishing dates of Jan.14 and Mar.22 respectively. The report published earlier （Sample 5） is entitled “Google Pullout Threat ‘A Pressure Tactic’ ”. Sample 5 also contains the word “threat”， which indicates that Google’s behavior is not reasonable， but used as a means to intimidate and exert pressure on the Chinese government. China Daily readers who leaf through the headline will probably have the feeling that Google is unwilling to maintain a healthy cooperative relationship with Chinese government， but intends to impose stress on it so as to achieve its goal， which of course is unacceptable by the Chinese government. Two months later after the news of Google’s pullout got around， China Daily published another report （Sample 6） entitled “The Biggest Loser”. And at this time， the headline is pervaded with a note of showing contempt to and gaining a sense of victory over Google. The headline indicates that in the process of Google’s opposing against the Chinese government in censorship， Google is the biggest loser， who has suffered and will continue suffering a tremendous loss once it abandons this huge market； and in the meanwhile， other foreign search engines and China’s native search engine， Baidu， will take the place of Google and hence occupy more and more market shares. b） Contrast of some representative words in the main body of the news reports
Following is Table 2 which contains some samples of the main body of the news reports covered by the leading newspapers in the world.
Table 2： Samples of the main body of the news reports covered by the leading newspapers
The first four samples （Samples 1-4） are taken from abroad， i.e.， the UK and the US； through the choices of certain words， it is not difficult for one to detect their prejudice and hostility toward China： they employ the expressions such as “human rights groups”， “Human Rights Watch” or “pro-democracy protests” to refer to those who are engaged in activities aiming at separating China， destroying the current unity and damaging the friendly relationship between Han people and 55 ethnic groups. From the adoption of these words， it can be seen that these western major media were showing their undue sympathy and support toward the Chinese separatists and target China for the disgraceful cyber attack even though the allegation hasn’t been confirmed yet. And therefore， the objectiveness of these economic reports is quite doubtful. Compared with the first four economic news reports coming from western major newspapers， China Daily is much more neutral. In Sample 5 and Sample 6， there are no expressions like “human rights activists”， instead， there are expressions like “strategy” and “challenge the sovereignty”， which indicate that in the eyes of the Chinese government， Google’s move is nothing but a “political trick”， another strategy it employs to press the Chinese government into giving its search engine no restriction across the border. This demand is totally unacceptable to China and any other nations in the world， for every nation has the right to protect its core interests from being offended， and demand that foreign enterprises should comply with the local regulations. To sum up， China Daily and other four western newspapers choose different words to express their standpoint toward Google’s pullout of China， from which one can detect distinctly different attitudes towards Google’s statement. It is noticeable that on the one hand， western newspapers wear a pair of colored glasses to watch this event， accusing China of the malicious cyber attack with no sufficient evidence； by contrast， China Daily， as the most authoritative English newspaper， defends firmly the legal rights and interests of the country， and takes a more neutral view upon this event. c） Contrast of social context
Fairclough argues that every instance of language use can be viewed as a social practice. If we want to detect the ideology invested in the discourse， it would be necessary to investigate the wider context to which the communicative event belongs. It should be pointed out that so far the final answer to the real cause why Google pulled out of China hasn’t come out yet. Therefore， one cannot assert that Google’s alleged malicious cyber attack originated from China， nor can one exclude the assumption that Google’s pullout was due to its failure to conquer the huge Chinese market.
Throughout the event， Google reiterated that the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists had been attacked by hackers from China， and China stifled the freedom of speech on the cyber space. Since Google stated blatantly that it was suppressed by the Chinese censorship regulations and was not allowed to disseminate any forbidden sensitive political information， then western countries such as the UK and the US grasped this golden opportunity， by means of news reports， to denounce China on her human rights problems and， in the long run， to stain China’s image and lower China’s international fame. There is no denying that China has her own human rights problems， but this issue is universal and also exists in many other countries including the UK and the US. Furthermore， it shouldn’t be overlooked that each country’s human rights problem is specific and therefore it is unreasonable to judge and interfere with other country’s human rights problem with the standard only applicable to a certain country. Different countries have different national situations and the human rights problems can only be tackled by the local people. China is a large multiethnic country with a long history. For her， solving the human rights problems satisfactorily is really a time-consuming undertaking， which needs the great efforts of many generations. Therefore， the process for coping with China’s human rights problem is destined to be a long one， but so long as China is constantly making progress， this problem will be eradicated in the days to come. Just as the saying goes “Since in Rome， do as Romans do”， then it is a must for Google to abide by Chinese legislation and there is nothing wrong for the Chinese government to take corresponding measures to curb any illegal behaviors conducted by a foreign company. Google had no right to challenge China’s legislation， and its pullout of China would bring about little negative impact on the life of Chinese citizens， after all， other foreign search engines may pour into China and what’s more， the native search engine Baidu will get an opportunity to grow more and more powerful. The final loser is definitely none other than Google itself. 4 Concluding Remarks
This research has conducted a detailed analysis of sample English economic news reports from a critical perspective. By applying the basic theory of Fairclough’s Three-Dimensional Framework and analytical methods in Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar， this paper arrives at the following conclusions. First， Language is a byproduct of social practice； it reflects certain values of society in whatever is represented. So is the language in news discourses， which are inevitably laden with some values and ideological stance， rather than a pure representation of “facts”， Economic news reports are far from objective or impartial； rather， they reflect the reporters’ standpoints and ideological stances. In the case of Google’s pullout of China， western major newspapers （Washington Post， New York Times， Guardian， Telegraph） report it with the quotation of some anti-China sources， which is out of ulterior motive to damage China’s image. Secondly， reports are made mainly through deliberate lexical choice in line with the country’s own values and ideologies. Thirdly， the formation of any ideology cannot leave the social context. On many occasions， the ideology is reflected and influenced by the words and actions of the government. And the publicity function of mass media （e.g. newspapers） can help wield a huge influence on common people. In a word， on the one hand， ideology can be disseminated through non-literary language used in the mass media； on the other hand， language applied in the mass media can exert impact on the formation and change of a certain ideology. And thus readers’ critical thinking and awareness should be enhanced. Only when people read between the lines can they really understand how the news language is shaped by the ideology held in society.
References
[1]Deng Yanchang & Liu Runqing. Language and Culture [M].Beijing： Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press， 1989.
[2] Fairclough， N. Language and Power [M]. London： Longman， 1989.
[3]Fairclough， N. Critical Language Awareness [M]. Longman Group UK Limited， 1992
[4] Foucault， M. The Archaeology of Knowledge [M]. London： Tavistock Publication， 1972.
[5]Fowler， R. Language in the News： Discourse and Ideology in the Press [M].London： Routledge， 1991.
[6] Halliday， M. A. K. Explorations in the Functions of Language [M]. London： Edward Arnold， 1973.
[7]Hu Zhuanglin & Jiang， Wangqi. Linguistics： An Advanced Course Book [M]. Beijing： Beijing University Press， 2002.
[8] Richards， J. C& J. Platt & H. Platt. Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics [M]. Beijing： Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press， 2000： 138.
[9] Richardson， K. Signs and Wonders： Interpreting the Economy through Television[A].In A. Bell & P. Garrett （eds.） Approaches to Media Discourse[C]. Oxford： Blackwell Publishers Ltd.， 1998. 220-289.