Relationships Between Mothers and Daughters in Tan's The Joy Luck Club
“Now the woman was old. And she had a daughter who grew up speaking only English and swallowing more Coca-Cola than sorrow. For a long time now the woman had wanted to give her daughter the single swan feather and tell her, “This feather may look worthless, but it comes from afar and carries with it all my good intentions.” And she waited, year after year, for the day she could tell her daughter this in perfect American English (Tan 3).”
The American culture focuses more on the individual. Typical Americans always want to be independent. Traditionally, they never appreciate anything that they have, are selfish, and ignorant to other cultures. On the other hand, the Chinese culture has many strong beliefs concerning the family. Chinese women value their parents, especially their mothers. It is expected that their daughters also do the same. “Women from Asia value family. Family is all important. Husband, children, parents, relatives come first. Husband and children never take second place to her career (China Bride).” The Joy Luck Club emphasizes family values by explaining how each mother, Suyuan Woo, An-Mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-ying St. Clair, came to America so that their daughters could have better lives and everything that they didn’t have. Because the daughters in The Joy Luck Club were born in America, they wanted to be more Americanized than to recognize their true Chinese culture. In particular, Waverly Jong was less successful than her mother, Lindo, in finding her true identity. Lindo honors family and self. Waverly has a hard time finding her true identity. She builds a wall between her and her mother and tries to be he...
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... when she “let’s her mother in”. Waverly lets her mother in when they are at the salon. Lindo tells her daughter about her childhood and how she ended up in America. She tells Waverly that she named her after the street they lived on so that when she grew up and left, that she would take a piece of her with her. Waverly finally understands her mother. “Her mother has been waiting for Waverly to let her in, to accept her Chinese heritage so that she can accept Waverly’s Chinese-American future (49).”
Works Cited
Carey, Gary. Cliff notes on Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club. Lincoln, Nebraska. Cliff Notes. 1994.
The China Bride. 23 March 2000. http://www.chinabride.com/gen/whyasia.html
Chinese –American Women in The United States. Liu, Spring. 1997. http://www.ics.uci.edu/~tdo/ea/chineseWomen.html
Tan, Amy. The Joy Luck Club. New York. Ivy Books.1989.
Amy Tan 's novel, The Joy Luck Club, explores the relationships and experiences of four Chinese mothers with that of their four Chinese-American daughters. The differences in the upbringing of those women born around the 1920’s in China, and their daughters born in California in the 80’s, is undeniable. The relationships between the two are difficult due to lack of understanding and the considerable amount of barriers that exist between them.
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The American Dream can mean a number of different things to number of different people. Over the years this ideal has evolved and its definition will continue to change for many more years to come. What has not changed is the desire to achieve this dream. For decades now, people from all over the world have immigrated to the United States with hopes of obtaining this dream. However it seems that, to many immigrants the American dream has a very different and more modest definition. To many foreigners it means having the basic necessities in life and giving their children opportunities and life they ever had. Immigration can be a good and a bad thing. On one hand the overall standard of living is better but on the other hand it is almost inevitable that the family, especially the children, will lose some of their culture as they Americanize and assimilate. This is partially the reason why the mothers of The Joy Luck Club continue to have the Joy Luck Club meetings. Even though they are now in America, they want to make sure their daughters are exposed to and maintain the Chinese culture. Mother/ daughter relationships are a large component in Amy Tan’s award winning novel, The Joy Luck Club.
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In Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club, four Chinese born mothers and their four American born daughters tell stories from their own point of view about their relationships with one another. These four mothers demonstrate the finest parenting by trying to keep their heritage alive and educate their daughters, while being immigrants. Through the mothers' actions, they are able to teach and influence their daughters about their Chinese heritage, about everyday life and situations, and how to stand up for themselves all while being in an overwhelming American society.
The imaginary world of the collective Himba can be described and defined by their deity, Mukuru, and his interaction and guidance of the Himba people. They believe that Mukruru is the Supreme Being that guide them and assist them in their lives. "We live because Mukuru gives us life, and when we die we are not lost" (Crandall 24). The Himba believe that it is the will of Murkuru that they live and they will be saved when they are dead. "The Himba believed that ...
In the late 1800’s it was discovered that papa-amino-phenol, could reduce fever, but the drug was too toxic to use. A less toxic extract called phenacetin was later found to be just as effective but also had pain-relieving properties. In 1949, it was learned that phenacetin was metabolized into an active but also less toxic drug, acetaminophen. Since then, acetaminophen has been sold under many over the counter brand names, most popular being Tylenol.
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Throughout Amy Tan’s novel, The Joy Luck Club, the reader can see the difficulites in the mother-daughter relationships. The mothers came to America from China hoping to give their daughters better lives than what they had. In China, women were “to be obedient, to honor one’s parents, one’s husband, and to try to please him and his family,” (Chinese-American Women in American Culture). They were not expected to have their own will and to make their own way through life. These mothers did not want this for their children so they thought that in America “nobody [would] say her worth [was] measured by the loudness of her husband’s belch…nobody [would] look down on her…” (3). To represent everything that was hoped for in their daughters, the mothers wanted them to have a “swan- a creature that became more than what was hoped for,” (3). This swan was all of the mothers’ good intentions. However, when they got to America, the swan was taken away and all she had left was one feather.
Ho, Wendy. Swan-Feather Mothers and Coca-Cola Daughters: Teaching Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club. An excerpt from Teaching American Ethnic Literatures/ Nineteen Essays, ed. By John R. Maitino and David R. Peck. 1996. University of New Mexico Press.
One day everything is going great, in fact things could not be better and then you say something and your friend turns to you and says “oh my god, you sounded just like your mother”. That is when you freak out and think to yourself it is true I am turning into my mother. This is every daughters worst nightmare come true. When a young girl is growing up her mother always says and does things that the girl vows she will never say and do but she does. Very rarely do we see cases of women wanted to be like their mother but it usually happens even if they do not want it to. In the book The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan tells stories of four Chinese immigrant mothers and their relationships with the American born daughters. In this novel, Tan shows us the struggle these mothers face in teaching their American daughters about their heritage. Throughout the novel it becomes evident that the daughters feel it is important to learn about their history and develop stronger relationships with their mothers
Lindo Jong provides the reader with a summary of her difficulty in passing along the Chinese culture to her daughter: “I wanted my children to have the best combination: American circumstances and Chinese character. How could I know these two things do not mix? I taught her how American circumstances work. If you are born poor here, it's no lasting shame . . . You do not have to sit like a Buddha under a tree letting pigeons drop their dirty business on your head . . . In America, nobody says you have to keep the circumstances somebody else gives you. . . . but I couldn't teach her about Chinese character . . . How to know your own worth and polish it, never flashing it around like a cheap ring. Why Chinese thinking is best”(Tan 289).
The Joy Luck Club is a representation of the persistent tensions and powerful bonds between mother and daughter in a Chinese American society. The book illustrates the hardships both the mother and daughters go through in order to please the other. Also, it shows the troubles the daughters face when growing up in two cultures. This book reveals that most of the time mothers really do know best.
In life, many things can be taken for granted - especially the things that mean the most to you. You just might not realize it until you've lost it all. As I walk down the road finishing up my teenage days, I slowly have been finding a better understanding of my mother. The kind of bond that mothers and daughters have is beyond hard to describe. It's probably the biggest rollercoaster ride of emotions that I'll ever have the chance to live through in my lifetime. But, for those of us who are lucky enough to survive the ride in one piece, it's an amazing learning experience that will influence your entire future.