Amy Tan Mother Tongue Summary

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In her thoughts provoking article “Mother Tongue” Amy Tan reflects on her childhood and the way people treated her mother for her non-standard English. As we find out, the family is of Chinese origin and Amy Tan even tells the reader that she used to be ashamed of her mother’s English when her friends came to her. When the author refers to different Englishes she means that she uses a simple language when communicating with her mother and a standard literary English she learned at school, which she claims is burdened by passive constructions, nominative sentences, and Perfect Tenses. Also she provides an example of a simple language she uses with her husband. What is exciting is that he does not recognize it as a “broken” English as she uses it frequently. …show more content…

Amy spoke perfect English that’s why she had to ensure her mother to be treated respectfully and professionally. What I pointed out for myself in her essay is that stereotypically Asians are considered to succeed in engineering, math, but not in languages. Amy raised with such pressure at school but managed to stay rebellious towards such common beliefs. The thing about language ability tests is that there is always subjectivity to it. Everyone has a set of associations in mind which are limited by the number of answers given. For instance, synonyms and antonyms that spring to mind may be different as imaginative capabilities differ. Non- standard English with limited number of words and use of simple grammar structures may be full of vivid images, striking descriptions of events, as the author states in her

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