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Amy tan mother tongue
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Amy tan mother tongue analysis
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Life is tough when one doesn’t speak the native language or is new to a country. “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan is written in a first person point of view that tells the audience a story of a non-English speaker.Tan states the difficulty for her mother to communicate with another because people disrespect her mother. The presupposition that people treat one differently or without respect when one doesn’t speak English is a categorical truth. Tan’s purpose is to share her story and give the audience the message of how tough life is for non-English speaker, and that one has to work hard to achieve success, therefore non-English speaker deserve the same respect as other people.
In the article “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, she share her experience with different types of English that she uses with her
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Even though Tan came from a bilingual family, Tan is an excellent writer, and speak English fluently while I still have trouble in English. For example, I didn’t speak or understand English when I came to the United States. I had a hard time learning English, and can only use simple words, also known as “broken” English. In elementary school, I didn’t understand my teacher, therefore the school has to switch me to a class that has someone who speak Vietnamese. It takes time to learn a new language especially when one doesn’t have any experience. Amy Tan’s story is different because she speak English fluently, therefore she didn’t have to go through these obstacles. The similarity that Amy and I have is that math is our best subject. According to Tan “ Math is precise; there is only one correct answer. Whereas, for me at least, the answers on English tests were always a judgment call, a matter of opinion and personal experience” (Tan 493). Tan states that math is easier to interpret than English because math only has one answer, whereas, English has multiple correct
The author demonstrates a personal example of how communication became a barrier because of the way Tan had to assist when her mother would speak. Tan would often have to relay the meaning of her mother’s message, because her mother’s “broken English” was difficult for others to comprehend. When Amy was younger, she remembers having to act as her mother on the phone, so that people on the other end would treat her mother with the respect she deserved. On one occasion, when her mother went to the doctor to get her CAT scan results on a benign brain tumor, her mother claimed that “the hospital did not apologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan and she had come for nothing” (Tan, 544 ). It was not until Tan had talked to the doctor that the medical staff seemed to care about any of her mother’s complications. Tan seems to come to the conclusion that a language barrier affects both sides. Not only does it affect Tan, but it also appears to affect the people around her. For instance, this happens when Tan changes her major from the stereotypical “Asian’s become doctors” to an English teacher. She eventually learns to write fiction and other writings that she was constantly told she would never be successful at.
Language is an important part of who we are. It influences the way we think and behave on a great scale. However, sometimes it is forced upon us to go in different directions just so we can physically and mentally feel as if we belong to the society in which we live in. Just as we see in Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” and Richard Rodriguez’s “A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, both authors faced some challenges along the way by coping with two different languages, while still trying to achieve the social position which they desired.
In her narrative Mother Tongue, Amy Tan speaks of how the English language has shaped her life, drawing from personal experiences in her early life, to her daily use of English in the present. Tan begins her narrative by identifying her own “mother tongue”, which is simply the broken English her mother uses and has been accustomed to. Tan says that due to her mother’s broken English some are unable to understand her, thereby limiting Tan’s mother to function properly in our English speaking society. Tan shows the reader how her feelings toward her mother tongue have changed throughout her life drawing out a personal experience from her adolescence.
The article Mother Tongue, by Amy Tan is a personal look into how language, and the dialects of that language, can affect a person 's life. It 's a look into how the people inside the cultural circles who use dialect derivatives of a major language are treated by people who exist outside of those cultural circles. It shows us how society treats a person using a "broken" or "limited" dialect, and how society 's treatment of these people can also affect the children who grow up using these "broken" dialects. Tan wrote this article try and convey to the reader that English is a colorful, and ever-changing language that has many dialects. Tan makes the point, several times throughout the article, that society judges you based on the type of English that you use. Throughout the article, Tan uses both her mother, herself and society 's treatment of them as evidence to support her idea. The purpose of pointing this out is to show the reader that the language a person uses, whether it be taught to them in school or by a parent at home, isn 't indicative of a person 's intelligence or value, and they shouldn 't be judged as less for using it.
In the story “Mother Tongue,” by Amy Tan, Mrs. Tan talks about (in the book) her life and how she grew up with different Englishes was very hard and how it has affected her today. The setting of the book goes from being at lecture to the past of Amy Tan and her mother along with the different Englishes she had to come accustomed to. In “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, the author’s attitude towards the “different Englishes” she grew up with is fascinated. Amy Tan conveys this attitude through wanting to learn all different kinds of Englishes, her use of Englishes in her novel, and the acceptance she developed of her mother’s broken English.
In the work of Amy Tan’s “Mother’s Tongue” she provides a look into how she adapted her language to assimilate into American culture. She made changes to her language because her mother heavily relied on her for translation. She was the voice of her mother, relaying information in standard English to those who were unable to understand her mother’s broken english. She tells about her mother’s broken english and its impact on her communication to those outside their culture. Her mothers broken english limited others’ perception of her intelligence, and even her own perception of her mother was scewed: Tan said, “I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mothers ‘limited’ English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say.” (419) The use of standard english was a critical component to Tan’s assimilation into American culture. Standard English was an element she acquired to help her mother but more importantly is was an element that helped in her gain success as a writer. Tan changed her ‘Englishes’ (family talk) to include standard English that she had learnt in school and through books, the forms of English that she did not use at home with her mother. (417-418) Tan realized the ch...
Language can defined the type of person you become and it has an influence on our choices as well as lifestyle. Language itself has become a way of seeing life in a different perspectives. Tan discusses the many ways in which language has played a role in her life and the result from it. I can relate to Tan’s experience to some extent because I come from a bilingual household too. Just like Tan, I am one of my mother’s main source of communication with people who don’t speak spanish. I believe the notion of Tan’s “Mother Tongue” is stating that just because someone who cannot speak the English language perfectly, is considered less intelligent to many compared to those who can understand and speaks it fluently. But what makes us all unique is that it is rare to find two or more people who speak the same exact English. Even though both Tan and I helped our parent and come from different ethnic backgrounds; Tan came from a Chinese family while I came from a Hispanic family. We both share similar ideas about the language spoken in our household, and it was also a big challenge for both of us while we were being raised by an immigrant parent who spoke only “limited English”(Tan
Amy Tan, the author of The Joy Luck Club, talks about in the article, Mother Tongue, how her mother’s broken English would affect her daily life, how people treat her because of it, and how she feels about her mother’s language. She also talks about when she was in school she was pushed towards science and maths because of her cultural background, as an Asian American student; when she really wanted to write English and become an English major. In the beginning paragraph of the article, Tan explains how she has to depict the different Englishes she uses throughout her daily life in writing and how she is able to deal with it. Tan recently learned about the different types of English she uses daily. When speaking to a group of people about her book, The Joy Luck Club, she didn’t realize a difference in the way she was speaking until she saw her mother sitting in the room listening to her speak.
The writings of Amy Tan and Richard Rodriguez’s depicts a bilingual story based on two differing culture. On Mother Tongue, “Tan explores the effect of her mother’s “broken” English on her life and writing” (506). On the other hand, Richard Rodriguez “recounts the origin of his complex views of bilingual education through Public and Private Language” (512). From a child’s eyes, Tan and Rodriguez describe each joys and pain growing up in a non-English speaking family. Hence, may be viewed that cultural differences plays a major role on how one handles adversities.
Despite growing up amidst a language deemed as “broken” and “fractured”, Amy Tan’s love for language allowed her to embrace the variations of English that surrounded her. In her short essay “Mother Tongue”, Tan discusses the internal conflict she had with the English learned from her mother to that of the English in her education. Sharing her experiences as an adolescent posing to be her mother for respect, Tan develops a frustration at the difficulty of not being taken seriously due to one’s inability to speak the way society expects. Disallowing others to prove their misconceptions of her, Tan exerted herself in excelling at English throughout school. She felt a need to rebel against the proverbial view that writing is not a strong suit of someone who grew up learning English in an immigrant family. Attempting to prove her mastery of the English language, Tan discovered her writing did not show who she truly was. She was an Asian-American, not just Asian, not just American, but that she belonged in both demographics. Disregarding the idea that her mother’s English could be something of a social deficit, a learning limitation, Tan expanded and cultivated her writing style to incorporate both the language she learned in school, as well as the variation of it spoken by her mother. Tan learned that in order to satisfy herself, she needed to acknowledge both of her “Englishes” (Tan 128).
If you are not fluent in a language, you probably don 't give much thought to your ability to make your personality attractive, to be in touch with the people and be understood in your world, that doesn’t mean you are an underestimated person. Every person has something special to make them more unique, remarkable, and gorgeous between people. The opinions could lead towards success, or those opinions could be one that is losing, and have a negative impact on how people connect with you. In Amy Tan 's “Mother Tongue” she made this book for several reasons. She had started her life by learning language, and she always loved to spend her time to learn language, but this story focuses about Amy Tan 's mother with her terrible English,
In the essay “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, she states that “ Recently, I was made keenly aware of the different Englishes I do use.” This wasn’t something I really thought pertained to me until I thought about it a little more. As I thought about it, it did I would change how I talked depending on who I was around or texting. As I read this essay I was thinking that this was more about someone who English is a second language, but it’s not we all have a different way of talking to certain people.
Tan never acknowledged her use of two different "Englishes" until shortly before she wrote "Mother Tongue." In her story, she mentions that she was giving a speech to a large group of people about her latest book "The Joy Luck Club," when she "remembered one major difference that made the whole talk sound wrong. [Her] mother was in the room."(Tan 61) It was at this point in time when she paused, and discovered that she had unknowingly kept two social worlds apart by the use of her spoken language. She felt her speech was burdened with forms of English that she normally did not use with her mother. Even though Tans mother spoke "broken" English, Tan argues that her mothers' conversational skill "belies how much she actually understands. She reads the Forbes report, listens to Wall Street Week, converses daily with her stock...
English is an invisible gate. Immigrants are the outsiders. And native speakers are the gatekeepers. Whether the gate is wide open to welcome the broken English speakers depends on their perceptions. Sadly, most of the times, the gate is shut tight, like the case of Tan’s mother as she discusses in her essay, "the mother tongue." People treat her mother with attitudes because of her improper English before they get to know her. Tan sympathizes for her mother as well as other immigrants. Tan, once embarrassed by her mother, now begins her writing journal through a brand-new kaleidoscope. She sees the beauty behind the "broken" English, even though it is different. Tan combines repetition, cause and effect, and exemplification to emphasize her belief that there are more than one proper way (proper English) to communicate with each other. Tan hopes her audience to understand that the power of language- “the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth”- purposes to connect societies, cultures, and individuals, rather than to rank our intelligence.
The purpose of Amy Tan’s essay, “Mother Tongue,” is to show how challenging it can be if an individual is raised by a parent who speaks “limited English” (36) as Tan’s mother does, partially because it can result in people being judged poorly by others. As Tan’s primary care giver, her mother was a significant part of her childhood, and she has a strong influence over Tan’s writing style. Being raised by her mother taught her that one’s perception of the world is heavily based upon the language spoken at home. Alternately, people’s perceptions of one another are based largely on the language used.