This study examines Yungang Grottoes as a case to systematically investigate the discourse mechanisms and strategies in its image construction through critical discourse analysis. By analyzing multiple types of materials including official promotional texts, media reports, tourism guides, and online reviews, the research reveals how Yungang Grottoes’ image underwent discursive transformation from historical relic to cultural symbol and from local landscape to national icon. The study finds that Yungang’s image construction presents three discourse positions: “Millennial Buddhist Caves,” “Eastern Art Treasury,” and “National Treasure,” achieved respectively through temporal representation and authenticity rhetoric in historical narratives, professional interpretation and extreme evaluations of aesthetic value, and symbolic encoding of national identity with cultural subjectivity expression. The discourse construction process employs complex strategies including authoritative discourse legitimacy production, emotional mobilization, intertextual meaning proliferation, and multimodal synergy. Discourse production is deeply embedded in contestations among official power, commercial logic, and popular participation: official discourse dominates through institutional authority, commercial logic profoundly shapes discourse construction, and popular discourse gains expression space but remains constrained by existing discourse frameworks.

Shuqing Li. Image Construction and Discourse Strategies of Yungang Grottoes Tourist Site: A Discourse Analysis Approach. Academic Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (2025), Vol. 8, Issue 9: 49-58. https://doi.org/10.25236/AJHSS.2025.080908.

[1] Hong A, Hu D. Analyzing Foreign Media Coverage of China During the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics Opening and Closing Ceremonies: A Corpus-Assisted Critical Discourse Analysis[J]. Journalism and Media,2025,6(3):145-1155.

[2] Çepani A, Rushiti R. Modality in the Albanian language: A corpus-based analysis of administrative discourse[J].Open Linguistics,2025,11(1):20250061-20250080.

[3] Albakri A, Teimi C.Translating Obama’s Political Discourse from a Critical Discourse Analysis Perspective[J].International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation,2025,8(8):26-42.

[4] Ning J, Mo X.On Audiovisual Translation from the Perspective of Multimodal Discourse Analysis: A Case Study of Wolf Warrior 2[J].Forum for Linguistic Studies,2025,7(8).

[5] Zhou Y. Application of the IRF Framework in Analyzing Classroom Discourse in Exemplary Primary School English[J].Journal of Higher Education Research,2025,6(3).

[6] Zeng D. Danmu subtitling as a self-regulative practice: a descriptive discourse analysis of Bilibili danmu subtitles from ethical perspectives[J].Frontiers in Psychology,2025,16, 1577260-1577270.

[7] Yao Y. Feasibility Analysis of Research on National Image Construction in Sino-Italian Bilingual Dictionaries from the Perspective of Critical Discourse Analysis[J].Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Science,2025,9(7).

[8] Wang Y, Xie Y. How country names legitimize economic nationalism: a critical discourse analysis[J]. Discover Global Society,2025,3(1):71-79.

[9] Owens L S. How to Date to Find Your Mate: Cultural Discourse Analysis of Matchmakers’ Advice on Effective Dating Practices[J].Western Journal of Communication,2025,89(4):775-797.

[10] Li, P. Y. The construction mechanism of tourism discourse: Discourse construction of scenic area image[J]. Journal of Suihua University, 2019, 39(03), 83-86.