Mother Tongue Essay

Throughout our everyday life, we are constantly bumping into someone who speaks a different language. Language has always been a beautiful trait a person may possess, especially when it’s something out of the ordinary. There are many different languages spoken within our community alone. Regardless of where we go, language has a major effect on our lifestyle. It plays a major role when we are searching for a job because most employers are seeking people who can speak languages that meet the needs of their clients. From reading Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue,” we are informed of how she portrays her English language as a daughter, student and as a writer. Like Amy Tan, I was raised in a bilingual family and the transition from one language to another …show more content…
Having to learn another language can actually affect your life because saying one wrong word can make what you want to say come out a different way. English is the most common language spoken in our everyday life, but everyone has their own version of the English language and how they use it to communicate.
In “Mother Tongue,” Amy Tan describes to her readers how different it is to speak English to her mother and others around her. When she communicates with her mom it may seem normal, however, when others listen to their conversations, it is difficult to grasp what they are saying. We consider “broken English” the effect from learning a new language. Tan’s mother speaks mainly Chinese, but when she learned to speak English, it was not the way we speak it. She understands words different than we do. Tan mentions the reaction her mother had when she first heard her daughter speaking English. It was a kind of English she had never heard before. Therefore, her reaction was a shock. Tan’s grammar was proper, and to us, it may have made sense, but to her mother it seemed strange. The author states that she is fascinated by the language used in life. “I spend a great deal of my time thinking about the power of language- the way it can