Richard Fitzgerald 教授發表演講
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11月2日，Richard Fitzgerald教授受邀參加由廣東外語外貿大學高級翻譯學院舉辦的“2019年翻譯與國際傳播高層論壇”，並在會上發表了題為“Challenges and Opportunities for Discourse Analysis – WeChat is not Facebook”（“話語分析面臨的挑戰與機遇 —微信不是臉書”）的主旨演講。會後，Richard Fitzgerald教授分享了自己從社會學到傳播學的研究歷程及本次參會的感受。
從社會學博士到傳播學教授
Fitzgerald 教授是一位特殊的傳播學教授，因為他本科和博士階段都在學習社會學，或者說是形式社會學。大多數社會學家常常需要通過提問、訪談來獲取大量研究材料，而Fitzgerald 教授的形式社會學研究只觀察並瞭解人們在做些什麼。在完成博士論文期間，他經常去到電臺脫口秀節目現場，觀察人們通過廣播節目描述自己的世界、表達對世界的理解，逐漸轉向社會學和傳播學的交叉研究。
隨後Fitzgerald教授在卡迪夫大學語言學系的語言與傳播中心進行博士後研究工作，研究廣播語言，由此轉向語言研究。後來受邀到澳大利亞昆士蘭大學傳播系任教。儘管沒有語言學和傳播學的教育背景，但這並沒有阻礙他在這兩個領域深入研究。教授提及，自己在電臺訪談時就開始研究廣播語言，也曾在澳大利亞一家媒體工作過。正是社會學的學科背景使他熟練掌握社會學的研究方法，在社會語言學和媒體話語方面進行深入探索，並取得了豐富的研究成果，輾轉全球多地高校以後，他收到了澳門大學傳播系的邀請，目前在澳門大學傳播系進行教學和研究工作。在Fitzgerald 教授看來，傳播學和社會學是相互交融的學科，旨在觀察人們的行為，研究他們行為的目的和意義。
Richard Fitzgerald 教授接受專訪
微信：令人著迷的超級應用
Fitzgerald教授在本次論壇分享了對社交媒體的研究。他對中國社交媒體的興趣頗濃，“微信不是臉書，微博也不是推特，”教授覺得微信是一個超級應用。在西方的社交媒體中，每個應用只做一件事情，它們的功能並沒有交互融合，而微信集不同應用的功能於一身。
“中國的社會以及技術環境等方面因素，使得中國社交媒體有其獨特的發展趨向。”教授認為，中國社交媒體的創造性體現在使用者使用語言乃至方言和表情包的不同交流方式、以及社交媒體技術創新帶來的功能可見性。儘管許多國家和地區的社交媒體都在不斷變化，但中國在發展社交媒體的技術方面處於領先地位，在很多方面比西方更加先進。中國的社交媒體和互聯網發展適應了新媒體時代的用戶需求和環境，從而使微信更具吸引力。“讓我們暫時忘掉臉書，從微信和微博自身來認識它們，而不是通過對比西方社交媒體來認識中國社交媒體。”Fitzgerald 教授表示中國社交媒體非常值得探索，他的團隊正著力開展這方面的研究。
談及此次參加廣外“翻譯與國際傳播高層論壇”，Richard Fitzgerald教授首先衷心感謝主辦方的邀請，他表示自己有很長一段時間沒有參加過這麼有趣的會議。因為短短一天半的會議涵蓋了學術研究和論文發表、人才培養和行業實踐兩條主線，同時為學界和業界搭建了溝通的橋樑，讓學者與行業專家互相交流探討，他從中收穫良多。教授表示，今後將繼續與廣外翻譯與國際傳播研究中心加強交流合作，共同探討語言研究與傳播研究融合的未來。
Sourse: 廣外高翻SITS
Professor Richard Fitzgerald: Chinese Social Media Is Getting Ahead
November 2, Professor Richard Fitzgerald was invited to the “2019 Advanced Forum on Translation and International Communication” organized by the School of Interpreting and Translation studies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, and presented the keynote speech “Challenges and Opportunities for Discourse Analysis-WeChat is Not Facebook”. After the conference, Professor Richard Fitzgerald shared his research experience from sociology to communication and his thoughts at the conference.
From PhD in Sociology to Professor of Communication
Professor Fitzgerald is a special professor of communication because he studies sociology, or formal sociology from his undergraduate to PhD. Most sociologists usually need to get a lot of research materials through asking questions and interviews, while Professor Fitzgerald’s formal sociology research looks to observe and understand what people are doing. During the period of completing his PhD dissertation, he used radio talk shows to observe how people describe their world and express their understanding of the world through radio shows, and has sociology to work in linguistics, journalism and communication departments.
Professor Fitzgerald conducted his postdoctoral research at the Center of Language and Communication, Cardiff University, and was later invited to join the Department of Communication, University of Queensland, Australia. Although trained in sociology has been based mostly in linguistics and communication and most of his research is in these areas. It was the background of sociology that made him proficient in sociology research methods. He conducts in-depth explorations in sociolinguistics and media discourse, and has achieved rich research results. After moving between many universities around the world, he was invited by the Department of communication, University of Macau, and is currently teaching and researching in the Department of Communication at the University of Macau. According to Professor Fitzgerald, communication and sociology are intertwined disciplines which are designed to observe people’s behavior and study the purpose and meaning of their behavior.
WeChat: A Fascinating Super App
Professor Fitzgerald shared recent research on social media conducted at the University of Macau at the conference. He is very interested in Chinese social media. “WeChat is not Facebook and Weibo is not Twitter,” WeChat is a super app in China and very different from Western social media experiences where each application only does one thing, and their functions are not interactively integrated. WeChat combines the functions of different applications in one.
“Chinese social and technological environments have made a unique development trend of Chinese social media.” Professor Fitzgerald believes that the creativity of Chinese social media has been reflected in the different communication methods of using languages and even dialects and emojis, as well as social media functions through technological innovation. Although social media is constantly changing in many countries and regions, China is a leader in the development of social media technology and is more advanced than the West in many aspects. The development of social media and the Internet in China has adapted to the needs of users and environment in the new media era, which making WeChat more attractive. “Let’s forget about Facebook for a while and get to know them from WeChat and Weibo themselves, rather than understanding Chinese social media by comparing them with western social media.”
Speaking of participating in the “Advanced Forum on Translation and International Communication”, Professor Richard Fitzgerald expressed his heartfelt thanks to the organizer for the invitation. He said that he had not participated in such an interesting meeting for a long time. The short one-and-a-half-day conference covered the two main lines of academic research and industrial practice. The conference established a communication bridge between the academic community and the industry, allowing scholars and industry experts to exchange and discuss with each other, and he learned a lot from it. Professor Fitzgerald said that he looks forward to continuing to strengthen exchanges and cooperation with Translation and International Communication Research Center, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, to discuss the future of the integration of language research and communication research.