Traditional Chinese Discourse in Hu Jintao’s Report to the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. Summary of the Doctoral Thesis

Abstract

The topic of the dissertation is “Traditional Chinese Discourse in Hu Jintao’s Report at the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China”. The research focuses on the elements of traditional political discourse within the Hu Jintao’s report. The purpose of the dissertation is to analyze Hu Jintao’s report at the 17th National Congress of the CPC from the perspective of containing traditional Chinese political discourse elements. There are several aims in this dissertation that are formulated in accordance with the specific problem structure, including: to analyze the structure and content of the Hu’s report; to determine elements of traditional Chinese political discourse in the text of the report; to provide interpretation of the identified elements of traditional Chinese political discourse in static and dynamic perspectives; to uncover discursive strategies aimed at inclusion of the traditional Chinese political discourse into CPC’s communication; to uncover the political strategies behind the discursive strategies. The hypothesis of the dissertation states “Contemporary Chinese socialist discourse possesses such an interdiscursivity, that manifests itself through connecting elements of socialist discourse with elements of traditional political discourse, thus creating the ideological base for socialism with Chinese characteristics.” The theoretical framework of this dissertation is based upon the theories of Critical Discourse Analysis and Political Discourse Analysis (N. Fairclough, T. van Dijk, R. Wodak et al.). The ontological position of the thesis stipulates that the world is socially and discursively constructed. The epistemological position can be defined as interpretative. The methodology of the dissertation can be defined within the notions of discursive constructivism. The dissertation is structured according to the purpose and tasks. It is comprised of an introduction, 3 chapters, conclusion and bibliography. 1st chapter deals with theoretical framework of discourse analysis and the modes of its application to the political discourse of the PRC. 2nd chapter consists of a formalized description of the Hu Jintao’s Report at the 17th National Congress of the CPC, stressing the presence of the traditional discourse elements. 3rd chapter contains historic and semantic analysis of the traditional Chinese political discourse elements established within the Report. Novelty of the dissertation is constituted by the topic itself, the purpose of research, the tasks, the synthesis between the empirical material and the methods of data analysis, as well as the application of sinological resources to political science analysis. The theoretical framework applied within the thesis has been widened and developed in the direction of non-typical empirical material. The research can be applied in creating courses for university students as well as a reference for Latvian politicians that are contact with their PRC counterparts. The empirical data substantiates the claim made within the hypothesis: the discourse of the CPC is interdiscursive. This interdiscursivity serves as the ideological base for socialism with Chinese characteristics.