The Joy Luck Club does, in fact, go from being ethnic literature to becoming universal. Both mothers and daughters endure some kind of difficulty, and none of the problems are only being dealt by the Chinese. In fact, most ethnicities would share one or another complication with the mothers and daughters. Suyuan's tragedy was of her family being destroyed over Japanese invasion. Many people from many different nationalities also suffer foreign invasion, which leads to this predicament as being shared through many races. Lindo was forced to marry into a wealthy family, which, long before, was actually a common tradition throughout. An-mei's mother was forced to become a concubine of a wealthy man--although this aspect was not widely accepted
