Amy Tan Mother Tongue Analysis

Improved Essays
Have you ever thought how about much work it takes to overcome obstacles throughout your life? In "Mother Tongue" Amy Tan knew how hard her mother tried to defend herself from other people, but in instances people said they did not understand what Amy's mother was saying. "And I had plenty of empirical evidence to support me: the fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her" (Tan 651). Our biggest motivators in our lives might not change throughout the years for their hard work and dedication like my mother. My mother has impacted me in different aspects but not as much as her dedication. To help support my uncles and herself to give them what they needed for school and for herself. She dedicated herself to work to maintain her family together and for them to care for each other. What I have learned to admire from this is that you have to keep persisting to keep everything going in our families together, and for me to do the same thing. For me to keep going on …show more content…
The lack of communication between her brothers made them become distant among each other. Until one of them needed money or my mother forced them to see each other. She not being able to see them made it harder for her to interact with them. That forced my mother to become and act more like their mother instead of her sister. I saw my mom struggle with her siblings not wanting to talk to each other. That made it clear that the only person that will be able to reunite them was my mom. Her hard work made me realize that you should never give up in your family because they are the ones that are going to support you in your ups and downs. After the death of her parents, my mom had to sacrifice school and spending time with

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    My Core Beliefs

    • 844 Words
    • 4 Pages

    My mother is the primary person in my life that guided me and taught me my core values. She has always been an inspiration to me because of how loving and hardworking she is. When I was young, my parents got a divorce and going back and forth between my mom and dad's house was very hard on my sister and…

    • 844 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Lee Family Eulogy

    • 488 Words
    • 2 Pages

    I tried on several occasions to write a eulogy for my mother. If I had made the effort by hand, all that you would have seen would have been an enormous pile of paper balls tossed in and around the trash basket. I simply could not come up with the right words for the occasion. My thoughts and feelings about her passing were just too difficult to express publicly. Of course, I could relate any number of events in my life that were touched by my mother.…

    • 488 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Essay On Dorothy Perez

    • 556 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In like matter, my mother is a paintbrush to her very own work of art always making everyday more colorful. She is greatly appreciated for her unconditional love, compassion, bravery, and warmhearted spirit. Growing up looking back at memories of her at my school functions, kid sick days, and lectures for future decisions, she has always done everything by herself excluding my family. She has done everything from going to work, coming home, and getting her kids up early for school each and every day to going back to work graveyard. She is the most amazing person I have ever known.…

    • 556 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In my words, linguistic terrorism is a discrimination that opposes the other languages. People based on the language what you speak to decide your identify. Based on Tan’s refection in her essay, Tan has been a victim of linguistic terrorism since she has influenced by her mother. In “Mother Tongue”, she wrote, “I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mother’s ‘limited’ English limited my perception of her”. Amy Tan pointed out that her mother has played such important role in her childhood and affected to who she is.…

    • 378 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    We Can All Relate Somehow As Amy Tan shows embarrassment over her mother’s English, my parents didn’t know any English. They could understand more of it over the years but they couldn’t get themselves to speak it. I have always felt limited by my English skills, especially in school. In the reading by Amy Tan, “Mother Tongue” I relate to the whole essay.…

    • 1022 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Well that Tan used the conflict between mother and daughter made the story going of her mother's culture and her time when she was little back then. Her daughter which is in America and not China like her mom were things were probably more strict for her culture. ( her mother's ) Well that Tan is more of a trying to be more flexible towards her own culture more toward the American side of cultures. Because American's are more free to do what they when they want unless it's illegal.…

    • 237 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    How much does the way people speak, affect the ways they are viewed? Are these perceptions accurate? In Amy Tan’s “Mother’s Tongue” she goes in depth to describe how language has influenced the way she sees herself and others, along with her mother. Whether people realize it or not, language affects the way people are perceived and how they look at themselves. In my experience, although a lot of people believe the way people speak reveals their intelligence and ability, I believe that language is just tool and does not reflect the person speaking.…

    • 94 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In “Mother Tongue” Amy Tan discusses the differences in English among different cultural backgrounds. In Tan’s article she focuses on how people are narrow minded towards those of different culture and language backgrounds. She does not criticize nor correct others language. Tan says, “I am not a scholar of English or literature. I cannot give you much more than personal opinions on the English language and its variations in this country or others.”…

    • 1015 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” was interesting as it was the first time I really had to analyze my communication forms. I communicate differently when I speak because I’m introverted, yet when writing I’m solo and have time to collect and express my thoughts. I realized I really was the “listener”, whereas my father was the Big “Talker”. Recently I told my fiancé that communication was overrated since she complained about how difficult it was for her to figure me out as I didn’t explain in more depth during conversation.…

    • 211 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Amy Tan's Mother Tongue

    • 439 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In the story mother tongue, the author explains the different types of English’s that are used in the story and the author names them limited, simple, and broken English. Therefore to explain the meaning of the various English’s, I would say that “simple” is just the meaning of proper English with good grammar or the English she usually uses when she is working as a writer. For an example when the author states her use of simple or perfect English in the text of the story. “And then I said in perfect English, "Yes, I'm getting rather concerned. You had agreed to send the check two weeks ago, but it hasn't arrived.…

    • 439 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    In the short story "Mother Tongue", written by Amy Tan, is a wonderful story that addresses how language is not only a tool of communication, but a tool of measuring individual worth. Amy, a daughter of chinese immigrants, shares her personal story of the awareness and discrimination between broken and standard english. In addition, she describes her life with her mother and the hardships they had to face due to her mother's imperfect english in America. In the United States, you are required to know how to read, write and most of all know how to speak english.…

    • 133 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “Mother Tongue” is an essay that is elaborating on exploring the disparate ways in which her mother is defined by others because of her English speaking or “mother tongue.” Mother tongue is the interpretation of the English language person who has not been raised to speak English correctly which has been Amy Tan’s mother. Amy’s mother has not been able to have the opportunity of having the same speaking skills as Amy because her mother has been a Chinese immigrant. Since Amy has had more of the opportunities to actually speak properly she has helped her own mother to evaluate her communication in order for other to understand what she is speaking about with other people. English language has been confronted easily for people to understand and communicate but also on the other hand there is a portion who may come from another place or also where they were born as in referring to Amy Tan’s mother.…

    • 843 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Now that I have read Amy Tan’s essay and understand it I am able to conclude that Amy Tan has actual practical first hand experience that can back what she is claiming. It is because of the rebellious nature of Amy Tan that she become a writer as compared to a scientist or another field that favors mathematics. The most important thing is the fact that Amy Tan decided to do what she wanted to do despite of what others thought she should do with her life. I would also conclude that this essay had much more of meaning and than just describing her love for language. It also presents to us that language tool of understanding our social and cultural differences.…

    • 169 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The Essay Mother Tongue was written in 1990 by Amy Tan. This was written for people like her, who had trouble accepting the way their parent´s spoke. It was written to share an experience not many have and is about what she had to do because of her mother´s speech. These things can be known by inferred from the text and read the small bio before the reading. This text takes the form of an essay.…

    • 304 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    When speaking to others, we often forget is how we sound, and how we pronounce words differently from our peers. Amy Tan is a Chinese american author who wrote an article called Mother 's Tongue about her mother 's english affecting both of them in their lives. Tan noticed a lot of little details that were there with her mother 's English and her own. I noticed these details as well inside the article and came to the realization that people are discriminated against for having imperfect English.…

    • 856 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays