Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club Essay

Lindo’s upbringing was significant because her family was very traditional. As a result of her family abiding by tradition, Lindo was betrothed to Tyan-yu as a young girl. Lindo’s family treated her as if she was from a different family. When Lindo’s family lost everything in a flood, her father decided to move the family to Wushi. Lindo was old enough to move in with Tyan-yu’s family, so her family left her in Taiyuan with her future in-laws. When Lindo moved in with her new in-laws, Huang Taitai immediately put Lindo to work cooking, cleaning, and sewing. Lindo not only lost her family by moving in with the Huangs; she also lost her childhood innocence since she was forced to abandon playing with other children so she could be put to work. As a child, Lindo faced adversity due to her lack of American opportunities and therefore matured quickly.

Jing-Mei can not speak Chinese, and Suyuan can only speak broken English, "I talk to her in English, she answers back in Chinese" (23) so Suyuan could never adequately explain why she pushed Jing-Mei so hard.

The book mentions many different areas of China, including Kweilin and Wushi. The settings in this book create a drastic chasm between the mothers and daughters, because the settings in which each generation was raised is completely different. Tan uses each setting to create a different tone for each story. When An-mei discusses her childhood, she

Another conflict that arises from Confucianism is when Jing-mei was told to go back to China and tell her half-sisters about their mother. She said “‘what will I say? What can I tell them about my mother? I don’t know anything.’” (Tan 31). In Confucianism, very little of tradition is explicitly told from mothers to daughters in the form of text. Ritual actions are supposed to be observed, absorbed and understood in order to be preserved and handed down for posterity. But Jing-mei, who grew up in America, did not have a sense of following the tradition her mother brought to America, or rather considered the Chinese tradition to be eccentric.

There is a common theme of hope throughout the stories of The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. Even in the face of immeasurable danger and strife, the mothers and daughters in the book find themselves faithful in the future by looking to the past, which is only helped by the format of Tan’s writing. This is shown specifically in the stories of Suyuan and Jing-Mei Woo, Lena and Ying-Ying St. Clair, and Lindo and Waverly Jong. The vignette structure of The Joy Luck Club allows the stories to build on one another in a way that effortlessly displays both the happy and dark times in each mother’s life, which lets their experiences act as sources of background and guidance to their daughters in times when they need it most.

She was my mother,” (31).  Jing-Mei says this to her aunts after her mother had died, and she had to take your position in joy luck.  She felt like she never really knew her mother because of their miscommunication.  Suyuan Woo, Jing-Mei’s mother, had many hopes and good intentions for her daughter. While Jing-Mei wanted to be herself and still please her mother, Suyuan wanted her daughter to be a child prodigy. Always wanting the best for her daughter, Suyuan hoped Jing-Mei would one day become an extraordinary pianist.  Although Jing-Mei played the piano, she never put forth much effort into the music because her best was not good enough for her mother.  Nonetheless, she stopped playing the piano.  “I could only be me,” (154).  She could not be something that she was not; she could not live up to her mother’s expectations.  This symbolized one of Jing-Mei’s songs, “Pleading Child.”  Suyuan continues to put all the pressure on Jing-Mei so that she will not become like her mother for all the reasons she had come to America; hopes for a better life.

In a way, Jing-mei Woo is the main character of The Joy Luck Club. (related to what holds something together and makes it strong), her stories serve as bridges between the two generations of storytellers, as Jing-mei speaks both for herself and for her dead mother, Suyuan. Jing-mei also bridges America and China. When she travels to China, she discovers the Chinese essence within herself, this way understanding a deep connection to her mother that she had always ignored. She also brings Suyuan 's story to her long-lost twin daughters, and, once reunited with her half-sisters, gains an even more extreme understanding of who her mother was.

Her mother took this to heart and forced upon Jing-mei the responsibility of ‘becoming’ a prodigy. With every failed test, Jing-mei’s mom became more and more disheartened with finding her daughters prodigal talents, but she never gave up, even after Jing-mei gave up. This shows how her past has defined her culture, and her future, because when she lost everything, she could have given

However, once Jing-mei stepped off the plane and saw her sisters, she was able to embrace them with "all hesitations and expectations forgotten"(331). The rapport between Jing-mei and her sisters demonstrates the capability of Jing-mei to forget her fears and have faith that she can do anything. Both Suyuan and Jing-mei worked through their problems by remaining strong and willful, making their lives much easier in the end.

Remembering conversations she had with her mother, Jing-Mei notes, “I think about what my mother said, about activating my genes and becoming Chinese. And I wonder what she meant. Right after my mother died, I asked myself a lot of things… to force myself to grieve more. But now I ask the questions mostly because I want to know the answers” (Tan, 270-71). She feels as though it is too late to have closure with her mother, putting a strain on her relationship with the rest of her family.

In The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, Jing-Mei and her mother have a very rocky relationship. Tan develops a relationship between Suyuan and Jing-Mei that is distant in the beginning due to culture differences and miscommunication, but gradually strengthens with time and understanding. Both of them have different backgrounds and have been influenced by two different cultures. Suyuan grew up in China and behaves according to the Chinese culture and her American-born daughter Jing-Mei is influenced by the American culture that surrounds her and wants to become part of it.  Their relationship is also shaped by the pressure Suyuan puts on Jing-Mei. She wants her to be a perfect

The mother in the story tries everything in her power to make Jing-mei famous in some way. Yet Jing-mei was content to being herself.

To fulfill her unrealistic expectations, the mother pushes Jing-mei to be the best in anything and everything. At first, the reader may perceive the mother as the villain in the story; however, the mother just wants her daughter to have the life that she never had. Jing-mei does not understand her intentions.

“Two kinds” is a story, a Chinese girl whose life is influenced by her mother. Her mother came to America after losing everything in China. Jing-Mei’s mother was immigrated early to America from China who has “American dream”. Her mother had high expectations on her daughter and did not care how it could affect her. It made Jing-Mei become a stubborn and rebellious person. “In the years that followed, I failed her so many times, each time asserting my own will, … for unlike my mother, I did not believe I could be anything I wanted to be, I could only be me. (104) She expressed her anger by going against her mother's expectations in ‘who I am’, it inferred that such tendency come from her childhood experiences. Jing-Mei was frustrated because she could not satisfy her mother.

In The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, the older mothers that are part of the Joy Luck immigrated from China. In the article, thousands of people are fleeing their home country of Burundi and looking for a safe haven, like the mother of Jing-Mei Woo, Suyuan.