Christmas Dinner In Fish Cheeks, By Amy Tan

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Throughout the story, “Fish Cheeks,” by Amy Tan, the author speaks of her “worst” Christmas dinner when her family invited Amy’s crush and his family for christmas dinner. Overall, the story was actually telling of her best Christmas dinner ever where her parents taught her to respect her culture and not be afraid to be who she was. The author and narrator, Amy Tan, used tone to convey this message to the audience in a few different ways in the story.

To start off, a key point that ended up in a shift of the author’s beliefs upon her culture was demonstrated in the quote, “On Christmas Eve I saw that my mother had outdone herself in creating a strange menu. She was pulling black veins out of the backs of fleshy prawns.The kitchen was littered with appalling mounds of raw food.” This quote is essential to the disrespectful tone of of the story. Amy is extremely condescending of her culture and seems embarrassed of her culture and its food. …show more content…

“It’s polite Chinese custom to show you are satisfied,” explained my father to our astonished guests.”” This quote demonstrates proper Chinese culture that is considered rude and disruptive in American culture. What her parents seek to teach her here is to live life as she is and not what others expect her to be.Despite being Chinese in America, she should still respect her culture along with its beliefs and values. A shift in tone is demonstrated from the beginning to the end. At the start, the tone is very condescending and changes to a more respectful tone at the very end of the

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