Yang Rui
Yang Rui (Chinese: 杨锐; pinyin: Yáng Ruì, born 1963) is the host of Dialogue on CCTV News.[1]
Background
Yang Rui was born in Heilongjiang Province in China. He started his career as a journalist with China National Radio. Currently he is the presenter of Dialogue, an English language talk show where foreign guests have frequent appearances.
Dialogue
The show called Dialogue is a program that is formatted similar to Larry King Live and Imus in the Morning, in which the talks are generally political in nature. For example, the topics discussed are:
- Cross-Strait relations
- North Korea nuclear tests
- China's relations with foreign nations
- Trade issues
The show frequently features foreign guests. Sometimes these are heads of State. For example, on October 4, 2012 Mr. Yang interviewed Laura Chinchilla, President of Costa Rica.
The most typical presentation will involve an interview and/or debate format with two economic experts with academic or business credentials. Although most guests are Chinese, probably at least a quarter of the guests are foreigners.
According to David Shambaugh, Yang Rui's on-camera personality, which he describes as "aggressive (often impolite)", was designed to be as "hard" as the politics discussed, and was inspired by the style of the American broadcaster Mike Wallace. Dialogue's alternate host, Tian Wei, acts as a foil to Yang, being "female, atttractive, suave, polite, inquisitive, and intellectual", according to Shambaugh.[2]
Weibo controversy
On 16 May 2012, Yang posted a microblog on Sina Weibo criticising the involvement of foreigners in human trafficking and espionage operations in China.[3][4] Yang's statement occurred during an official Chinese government campaign to identify illegal foreign residents in China.[5] Five days later, he publicly defended his comments and sought to correct mischaracterisations of them, including the translation into English of Pōfù (泼妇) - used in reference to Melissa Chan, a recently departed American journalist - to "bitch" instead of "shrew".[6]
Charlie Custer, a former guest on Dialogue, called for a boycott of the show;[7] this call was joined by James Fallows of The Atlantic Monthly.[8] Fallows also quoted previous Weibo comments by Yang in which the host criticized press freedom in the United States and specifically the American media's reluctance to support a Palestinian state, attributing this stance to U.S. media's "Jewish bosses".[9]
References
- ^ CCTV Anchor Bio
- ^ Shambaugh, David (2013). "China's Global Cultural Presence". China Goes Global: The Partial Power. Oxford University Press. p. 231.
- ^ Global Times (2012). China on the hunt for illegal foreigners. Retrieved 18 May 2012.
- ^ The Wall Street Journal (2012). State TV Host Offers Advice on How to Throw Out ‘Foreign Trash’. Retrieved 19 May 2012.
- ^ China Digital Times (2012). TV Host Applauds “Cleaning Out Foreign Trash”. Retrieved 20 May 2012.
- ^ The Wall Street Journal (2012). State TV Host Responds to Controversy Over ‘Foreign Trash’ Comments. Retrieved 22 May 2012.
- ^ Chinageeks (2012). Yang Rui, etc.
- ^ The Atlantic (2012) China Soft-Power Watch: The Yang Rui 'Foreign Bitch' Factor
- ^ The Atlantic (2012) The Yang Rui Saga Morphs Into the Surreal