Personage description in Hong Kong versus Mainland China entertainment news discourse

With the approach of critical linguistics, the study compares and contrasts the personage description in Hong Kong and Mainland China entertainment news discourse. Examining the texts of the news reports against the different social contexts they were produced, the study establishes three contrastive parameters that characterize the personage reporting across the two regions: contrast in narrative values and themes--realism versus idealism, contrast in representation of the speech by the personage--individualization versus assimilation, and contrast in rhetoric of text--on-line interaction versus planned exposition (fragmented versus elaborated structure). Finally, implications for further development as well as application of critical linguistics or critical discourse analysis are presented.