National Image in English Translation of Country Leader's New Year Greetings

Abstract

Based on Fairclough's three-dimensional critical discourse analysis model, this study investigates China's image in the English translation of the country leader's New Year Greetings from 2014 to 2021. The method of corpus linguistics is applied, and the English modal system from the systemic functional perspective is employed. The study reveals that the country's image is hardworking, enjoying good governance and social harmony, pursuing peace and development, as well as international cooperation, which can be reflected in the use of high-frequency content words, keywords, and modal verbs in the discourse. The county's image construction in the translation discourse is influenced by translators, media, and sociocultural factors.