摘 要

“第一夫人”已经成为世界文化交流，信息传达和情感表达的一个符号，中国第一夫人——彭丽媛女士的首次亮相，更是引起了众多媒体的高度关注和评价，从某种程度来说，她已经成为一个新的中国符号。国内外的关注点更多的落在她作为“第一夫人”的外交影响力和时尚影响力上，然而，作为一个国际性符号，中国第一夫人还具有代表中国女性的符号意义，因此需要对其体现的中国女性魅力进行分析。本文以国外媒体（西方主流英文媒体）的十篇相关报道为研究对象，借助符号学理论，探讨彭丽媛女士所代表的中国女性形象。

本文共分为五章。第一章主要讨论研究背景、研究目的及研究意义；第二章深入探讨符号学理论以及中国的女性符号；第三章着重比较中国女性符号与美国女性符号；第四章主要阐释了彭丽媛女士作为妻子、歌唱家和文化传播者所代表的中国女性魅力；第五章为总结部分，总结了以上全部研究和发现。

关键词：中国第一夫人；女性魅力；符号学

Abstract

“First lady” has already become a symbol for international cultural exchange，information transmission and emotional expression. The debut of Chinese first lady—Peng Liyuan attracts attention and reports from many media, all of which give her a high remark. And to some certain extent, she has become a new Chinese symbol. Media in China and abroad focus more on her diplomatic influence and fashionable influence. However, as an international symbol, Chinese first lady is also charactered by her female symbolic meaning. Therefore, it’s necessary to make an analysis of her female fascination. With the help of semiotic theory, the paper, researching 10 foreign reports from the main west English media about Chinese first lady, is expected to discuss the symbol of Chinese women that Peng Liyuan represents.

The whole paper consists of five chapters. The first chapter mainly introduces the research background, research purpose and research significance. Chapter two deeply discusses the semiotic theory and the symbol about Chinese females. Chapter three stresses more on the comparison of Chinese and American symbol. Chapter four primarily explains the Chinese female fascination that Peng Liyuan represents as a wife, singer and cultural disseminator. The last chapter is a conclusion summarizing all the researches and findings above.

Key words: Chinese first lady；female fascination；semiotics

Contents

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Research Background 1

1.2 Research Purpose 2

1.3 Research Significance 3

2. Semiotics and Symbols of Chinese Females 4

2.1 Semiotic Background 4

2.2 Symbols of Chinese Females 5

3. Comparison of Foreign and Chinese First Lady 7

3.1 The Symbol of clothes 7

3.2 The Symbol of Scenes 8

3.3 The Symbol of Action 9

4. Composition of the Symbol——Peng Liyuan in Semiotics 10

4.1 A Powerful Spokesperson 10

4.2 A Loving, Caring and Responsible Woman 11

4.3 A Patriot and Cultural Disseminator 12

5. Conclusion 13

References 14

Acknowledgements 16

Semiotic Interpretation of Foreign Reports about China’s First Lady

1. Introduction

• 1. Research background

Since Peng Liyuan, as the Chinese first lady, made her diplomatic debut in March, 2013 in her first overseas state visit with President Xi, the previously secretive role—Chinese first lady began to attract worldwide attention with overwhelming compliments. And it is worth mentioning that nearly no previous Chinese first ladies had gained so much tremendous momentum from the world before. Undoubtedly, Chinese first lady has already become a new symbol for china.

In the eyes of Chinese people and netizens, they enthused about their newly first lady for they have always looked forward to having an elegant first lady who could hold a candle to Michelle Obama and be presentable to the outside world. For English media, her influence in diplomacy and fashion were rather favored. After Chinese first lady’ debut, German media—Die Welt, publishing Peng Liyuan’s pictures of her first accompanying state visit in the front-page headlines, reported that when Peng Liyuan took that bunch of flowers form Vladimir Putin, it bespoke that she was the best soft power of China at present. To be sure, almost every mainstream western media reported this news about the charm offensive of the newly Chinese first lady in the headlines.

Besides, she was more likely to be accentuated by her diplomatic strength in Chinese academe for she opened up new dimension in foreign affairs as a diplomatic star. Moreover, papers about Peng Liyuan gave a preference to judge on her fashionable style and political influence—a beautiful power and a diplomatic touch. According to the 36 papers in CNKI that contain “Chinese first lady” in titles, 11 papers are focusing on her diplomatic influence, while with 16 papers concentrating on her image of fashionable choice. It’s evidently that researchers put much attention to the symbol of “first lady” rather than the symbol of “Chinese female”.

• 1. Research purpose

In China, there is a strange phenomenon in our society where people madly cling to foreign luxury brands. In social network, foreign luxury goods with highlighted logos are more favored to be posted by most netizens. The crazy pursuit for the luxury logos even stimulates a majority of people to buy the fake goods so as to show off among friends. In addition, for women, it’s not difficult to find that they are feeling resentment at being treated unfairly and puzzled at their social roles. Even though women are sharing an equivalent social status with the men, facts proved that women are unreasonably required to be an amusement tool and to take good care of their family rather than to continue their professional work. Recently, in a well-known movie star’s wedding, one bridesmaid was being teased in public, which has been a heated topic in Microblog. A great number of netizens posted a strongly condemn to the best men. But regrettably, some netizens with the malevolent comments even criticized the bridesmaid for she worn very little clothing. It’ clearly that a raft of men don’t know how to respect the women and that women are not sure of their social positioning. This directly leads to cruel reality that Chinese women hold negative attitude to their social status and was puzzled at their roles in modern society. So it’s necessary to encourage and attach major significance to the introduction of a typical female figure with strong influence on establishing sound female attitudes.

The paper is expected to pay close attention to the interpretation of Chinese female fascination and the modern values by setting Peng Liyuan as a female symbol, according to English media’s reports about China’s First Lady. It is not only to highlight the hallmarks of modern women, but also to point out the fascination of Chinese female as well as the female power.

Female symbol will be mainly discussed from the point of semiotic perspective by accentuating the words and pictures of China’s First Lady adopted by the English media such as CNN, Washington Post, NPR, New York Times and the hot English comments given by foreign cyber friends. With that as a basis, the reports about her visit to the local schools, children hospitals as well as orphan asylums, participation of music activities ranging from her first debut in March, 2013 to November, 2015 are going to be collected. By means of making a comparison with the American First Lady in words selection and part of speech, it is expected to concentrate on the differences as well as the similarity between the western and eastern female roles mainly from the aspects of dress, scene and action.

The analysis of a series of influences on the stunning female symbol of Chinese first lady in terms of semiology will be made as follows:

1. Semiotics and Symbols of Chinese Females