Home > News & Events > Upcoming Events

The 44th PhD Academic Salon of Translation Studies, 24 December

Last updated:2013-12-19

Topic: Analysing Value-laden Discourse in Trans-edited News Headlines with the Appraisal Framework
Speaker: Professor Zhang Meifang, University of Macau
Chair: Wang Xiulu

Time: 16:30-18:00, Tuesday, December 24, 2013
Venue: Room 210, School of Foreign Languages Building, South Campus
Organizer: Translation Studies Institute, Sun Yat-sen University

Abstract:
News headlines are a kind of paratexts which occupy a privileged place of pragmatics and strategy in news reports. They are expected to offer key information of the news events and to attract the target readers. This study discusses the stances and mediation reflected in global news headlines of four international news events which happened between the years 2008-2010. It draws on the Appraisal framework which was developed by Martin and White (2005) upon Halliday’s (1978, 1995) SFL, as the theoretical support for the analysis. The analysis shows that global news headlines involve working with discourse that is heavily mediated and recontextualized in which the transeditors put their own values and the institutional stances into the transedited texts. It is argued that when value-laden discourse is an indication of a stance adopted, an absence of such discourse in news headlines, or even an absence of reporting on a particular event may also be an indication of a stance adopted by a news agency.
Keywords: value-laden discourse; transedited news headlines; stance, mediation

Bio-note: 
ZHANG Meifang received her PhD degree (Specializing in Translation Studies) from Hong Kong Baptist University in 1999. She joined the University of Macau in 2003 and holds a full professorship. She was previously Professor of English and Translation in the School of Foreign Languages of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, where she also served as Head of the English Department (2000-2002). At the University of Macau, she is subject leader of translation and coordinator of the MA in Translation Studies.  Prof. Zhang is currently Vice President of the Macau Federation of Translators and Interpreters, and Council Member and Expert Member of the Chinese Translators’ Association. She also serves as a member of the editorial board of the Chinese Translators’ Journal and for several other refereed journals.  She teaches courses on translation and supervises MA and PhD students in Translation Studies. Her main research interests are in Translation and Intercultural Studies, Translation for the Media, Discourse Analysis and Contrastive Study of Chinese and English languages and cultures.  

Contact details:
ZHANG Meifang (PhD, Professor)
Coordinator of MA in Translation
FSH, University of Macau
Av. Padre Tomas Pereira, SJ, Taipa, Macao, China
Tel: (853) 83978249 Fax: (853) 28 838 312
Email: MFZhang@umac.mo
Personal website: http://www.umac.mo/fah/de/staff/zhangmeifang.html

All welcome!