Deep Patel
February 8, 2016
ENGL 1102
Dr. Goss
Mother and Daughter
Two Kinds by Amy Tan is a short story from her novel The Joy Luck Club. The main character of the story is Jing-mei. Jing-mei assumes the role of the narrator of the story and talks about her her past which is used to develop the theme in the work. The topic of the short story is mother-daughter relationship. Two Kinds explores the theme of parents don’t always know what’s right for their children and children don’t always know what’s right for them. Tan views the past with feelings of regret and remorse thinking maybe if she had tried hard enough her mom would have died being proud of her.
The short story Two Kinds by Amy Tan is a tale of a young Chinese girl’s life as a teenager
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This theme is developed by Jing-mei looking to her past and realizing that she should listened to her mom. Jing-mei is struggling with high expectations of her mother, to become a prodigy. Her mother is trying to fulfill the missing pieces, her mother hopes to seek it through Jing-mei. The story is written in way that the reader does not know if the mother and daughter were fair to each other. Certain scenes allow the reader to have their own interpretations of the situation therefore hinting that Tan felt remorse after her mom died. By writing in such a way that the author is not taking sides, the author illustrates her emotions about not fulfilling her mother’s hopes and dreams she had for her. Jing-mei realizes that her lack of trying to better herself causes many problems between their relationship. She also realizes that had she followed her mom advice she would have lived a better life. Amy Tan portrays herself as Jing-mei’s character who is defiant and stubborn, furthermore by viewing her past in such a way allows her to judge the actions or decisions carried out by her and her mother and develops the theme of parents don’t always know what’s right for their kids and kids don’t always know what’s best for
Our mothers have played very valuable roles in making us who we are and what we have become of ourselves. They have been the shoulder we can lean on when there is no one else to turn to. They have been the ones we can count on when there is no one else. They have been the ones who love us for who we are and forgive us when no one else wouldn’t. In Amy Tan’s “Two Kinds,” the character Jing-mei experiences being raised by a mother who has overwhelming expectations for her daughter, which causes Jing-mei to struggle with who she wants to be.
Jing-mei realizes her mother was trying to help her out, but since their personalities clash, Jing-mei first believed her mother was forcing her to play piano. She thought her mother was setting up unrealistic expectations for her, when only she just wanted to see her daughter live the American Dream. She didn’t understand the Chinese way of thinking so she thought her mother was just being strict. Her mother wants her to be a strong, independent American woman. She just wanted her daughter to have all the opportunities she wasn’t able to have in China.
In Tan’s Two Kinds the story is a about an Asian family trying to assimilate to an American lifestyle. The mother, who was originally from china, wants to turn her daughter into a "prodigy" so she can be famous and live an extravagant lifestyle. The mother who "Believes you could be anything you wanted to be in America", spends most of her time watching TV, hoping to find a talent, which her daughter might possess. After several attempts at many different talents, the daughter becomes very frustrated and hateful towards her mothers attempts to change her.
I am saddened by the relationship between An-mei and her mother. “ I knew it was my mother even though I had not seen her in all my memory”, this shows us that, despite being mother and daughter, they did not have the opportunity to establish a close bond. An-mei had no memories of her mother, even though she “knew it was my mother”. An-mei’s mother is foreign and strange to her as her mother looked “strange too, like the missionary ladies at our school, who were insolent and bossy in their too-tall shoes, foreign clothes, and short hair”.
In “ Two kinds” Amy Tan uses characterization, point of view, imagery and mother’s diction to convey her theme of mother daughter relationships. i learned that i cant always please my parents in everything i do. but i also know that i owe them so much for what they have sacrificed to bring me here so i always listen to there advise and try my best to be a obedient son even though i can be rebellious at times just like
She honored her parents as she should, but longed for them to pass. In the beginning of the story she said "I had never expected my parents to take so long to die.” She had taken care of them all of her life she was in her fifty’s and her parents in their ninety’s. She was ready to live and break free of all the rules and duties put upon her, they were like chains binding her and holding her down. She was ready to explore to go on journeys and adventures she was already aging all she wanted was to be free. Her parents’ death let her run free, she left Hong Kong to start over and maybe find love, in any way possible, maybe even through food or luxuries. She wanted to be rebellious of her parents I’m sure she knew they wouldn’t approve but she didn’t care she wanted change. All her life she had followed so many rules, she had to fight to teach, to learn, to be with friends, her fight was finally over. She now had no one to rebel against, she now had the freedom to
In the short story, "Two Kinds" by Amy Tan, a Chinese mother and daughter are at odds with each other. The mother pushes her daughter to become a prodigy, while the daughter (like most children with immigrant parents) seeks to find herself in a world that demands her Americanization. This is the theme of the story, conflicting values. In a society that values individuality, the daughter sought to be an individual, while her mother demanded she do what was suggested. This is a conflict within itself. The daughter must deal with an internal and external conflict. Internally, she struggles to find herself. Externally, she struggles with the burden of failing to meet her mother’s expectations. Being a first-generation Asian American, I have faced the same issues that the daughter has been through in the story.
For many of us growing up, our mothers have been a part of who we are. They have been there when our world was falling apart, when we fell ill to the flu, and most importantly, the one to love us when we needed it the most. In “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, it begins with a brief introduction to one mother’s interpretation of the American Dream. Losing her family in China, she now hopes to recapture part of her loss through her daughter. However, the young girl, Ni Kan, mimics her mother’s dreams and ultimately rebels against them.
The struggle of self identity as she realized that all this while, her mother was right. Once you are born Chinese, you cannot help but feel and think Chinese. Amy Tan’s “A Pair of Tickets” presents an incredibly interesting perspective of a woman named Jing mei who is traveling through her native country of china, embarks on this journey of self-discovery to find her true chinese roots. The opening scene of "A Pair of Tickets" is an appropriate setting for Jing mei remark of becoming Chinese, because the introduction grabs the audience attention. We are first starting out in the story as reading Jing mei turning from American to Chinese in an instant second of the moving of a train from one city to the next. The narrator
“I liked the haircut, and it made me actually look forward to my future fame.” “Two Kinds” is a short story adapted from the novel, The “Joy Luck Club”, which is written by Amy Tan. It focuses on the optimism of the dynamic protagonist, Jing-Mei (June). This short story follows the life of Jing-Mei as she lives her childhood in San Francisco with her strict and expecting mother, who left seek a better life away from the war in China. Her mother believed that she could be a prodigy and become anything she wanted to be in America and because of this her expectations has always been very high.
One may argue that there aren’t very many characters in “Two Kinds,” but these characters are defined intensely. One way Tan achieves this is by describing Jing-Mei indirectly through her views. We read,
“Two Kinds” A relationship between a mother and daughter can be a rough road sometimes, when a mother is constantly imposing and making decisions for her daughter. In the short story, “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan is a story about how a mother pushes her daughter to live up to the highest expectations that any mother could possibly think of. It all starts to begin when her mother loses everything in china and moves to America. Jing-Mei’s mother wants her to become a successful, famous Chinese woman, but Jeing-Mei has something else on her mind about how she wants to live her life. With all things to consider, her new life in America was to show her daughter that she could be anything she wanted to become with hard work, and dedication.
The story "Two Kinds" by Amy Tan is about a mother and daughter who have strong conflicting ideas about what it means to have a sense of self. This may be partly due to the mother growing up in China, which is a very different culture than the American culture where endless opportunities are available to anyone who wants to pursue them. Jing-mei's mother wants her daughter to be the best, a prodigy of sorts, and to have the kind of life, full of hopes and dreams that she did not have. In the beginning of the story Jing-mei liked the idea of becoming a prodigy however, the prodigy in her became impatient. "If you don't hurry up and get me out of here, I'm disappearing for good." It warned. "And then you'll always be nothing" (500). After disappointing her mother several times Jing-mei started to detest the idea of becoming a prodigy. The idea Jing-mei's mother had for her to become a prodigy was too much pressure for a small child and was something that Jing-mei was clearly not ready to be. As a result the pressure that her mother laid upon her only made Jing-mei rebel against her mother and she resisted in giving her best. Jing-mei did this because she only wanted her mother's love and acceptance for who she was not only what she could become. Furthermore, Jing-mei's point of view of being the kind of person that one can be proud of was very different from her mother's point of view.
In Amy Tan 's Two Kinds, Jing-mei and her mother show how through generations a relationship of understanding can be lost when traditions, dreams, and pride do not take into account individuality. By applying the concepts of Virginia Woolf, Elaine Showalter, and the three stages of feminism, one can analyze the discourse Tan uses in the story and its connection to basic feminist principles.
Jing-Mei was forced to take piano lessons; this only further upset her as she felt that she was a constant disappointment. Her mother was mad at her on a regular basis because Jing-Mei stood up for herself and explained to her that she didn’t want to be a child prodigy.