Table 1_Modifiers.

Despite the growing body of research on media representations of China during the COVID-19 outbreak, limited scholarly attention has been devoted to Western news coverage of specific events involving China. Based on a self-built corpus of reports from English-speaking news sources on “China’s Humannitarian Aid to Europe (2019-2024)”, this study aims to contribute to the scholarship by examining how Western news media represents China’s humanitarian aid to Europe, using quantitative and qualitative methods. The study employs corpus-based Critical Metaphor Analysis to analyze how China is linguistically represented through discursive strategies. Guided by the conceptual metaphor THE NATION AS PERSON, the analysis reveals a series of secondary metaphors—including CHINA AS PERSON, EUROPE AS PERSON, and AMERICA AS PERSON. In particular, CHINA AS PERSON is associated with multifaceted images such as “a politician,” “an upstart,” “a vendor,” “an aggressor,” and “a dictator,” which collectively serve to undermine China’s efforts and reframe humanitarian aid as a diplomatic maneuver. This highlights the effectiveness of corpus-assisted CMA in in analyzing media representations of national images amid a global health crisis.尽管当前学界针对新冠疫情（COVID-19）期间涉华媒体表征的研究日益增多，但针对西方新闻媒体报道中国相关具体事件的学术关注仍较为有限。本研究基于自建的英语新闻语料库（corpus），该语料库收录了2019-2024年间有关“中国对欧人道主义援助”的相关报道，旨在通过定量与定性结合的研究方法，探究西方新闻媒体如何表征中国对欧人道主义援助，以期为相关学术研究提供补充。本研究采用基于语料库的批评隐喻分析（Critical Metaphor Analysis, CMA）方法，剖析西方媒体如何通过话语策略在语言层面表征中国。本研究以“国家即人（THE NATION AS PERSON）”这一概念隐喻为分析框架，揭示出一系列次级隐喻，包括“中国即人（CHINA AS PERSON）”、“欧洲即人（EUROPE AS PERSON）”以及“美国即人（AMERICA AS PERSON）”。具体而言，“中国即人”这一隐喻关联着多重形象，诸如“政客”“暴发户”“商贩”“侵略者”以及“独裁者”，这些形象共同作用以消解中国的援助努力，并将人道主义援助重新定义为一场外交博弈。该研究凸显了借助语料库的批评隐喻分析在全球公共卫生危机背景下分析国家形象媒体表征的有效性。