Foreign news in East Asia’s mass media: new research directions

Abstract

The article discusses the prospects of the foreign news research in the media of modern East Asia. The authors present a brief literature review on political discourse in East Asian media and suggest possible research strategies for studying the international agenda in the media of these countries. The article argues that such research approach is valuable as it allows one to better understand the way East Asian countries view foreign news and international relations, study the socio-political processes in this region from a new angle and evaluate the role of the media in politics. The article discusses several social sciences theories that can help to explain and interpret observations obtained during the analysis of publications in the media, for example, the theory of media domestication, the concepts of external legitimacy and "othering". Political regime, independence and commercialization of the media are discussed among explanatory factors. The authors pay attention to the specifics of these theories’ application to the case of East Asia, provide recommendations for data collection and research methods, and discuss various research trajectories. For example, researchers can focus on trends in the representation of an event in the media using content analysis of a large number of publications, another possible strategy is to study a small number of articles using critical discourse analysis in order to identify discursive practices and their relationship with political processes and power. Knowledge of the language, history, politics and culture of East Asian countries, gives researchers of East Asia a significant advantage in conducting such research and could provide valuable contributions.