Lin Shus: A Short Story

Jin Wang is embarrassed to even be apart of his family by the way he acts and how he represents their culture. He now can see how hard it is to fit in.

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.

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.

Also, their relationship is shaped by the pressure Suyuan puts on her daughter. When Jing-Mei was growing up, her mother had the need for her daughter to be smart, talented, and a respectful Chinese daughter. This pressure put on Jing-Mei resulted in misunderstanding between mother and daughter. Jing-Mei constantly believed, “that she was disappointing her mother,” because she felt as if she failed at everything her mother wanted her to do. She believed she could never be as perfect as her mother was. Therefore she doesn’t think she is worthy enough to take her mother’s place at the Joy Luck Club “They must wonder now how someone like me can take my mother’s place” (Tan, 27). Jing-Mei does not understand that her mother wanted the best for her; Suyuan wanted Jing-Mei to challenge herself because that is how one builds up character. Suyuan thinks her daughter could do anything she proposed to do but never put enough effort into anything “Lazy to rise to expectations” (Tan 31). Furthermore, Suyuan forced Jing-Mei to learn how to play the piano and then perform at a recital. Jing-Mei rebelled against her mother and refused to learn how to play the piano well. So, at the recital she ends up forgetting the music notes. Jing-Mei blames her embarrassment on her mother and states,

In contrast, during the era of The Story Yingying, the cultural norm for a woman was to be submissive, patient, and passive. Yingying upheld all of these cultural standards. After meeting Zhang for the first time Yingying showed no interest in him at all but overtime Yingying finally gave into Zhang and fell in love and they became engaged. Unfortunately, Zhang had to leave for a year to go take a civil service examination, but he promised her he would come back to her. She waited patiently and after a year, her fiancé returned but shortly after had to leave again to retake the examination. Again she waited patiently for his return, but he never came back. After waiting for years for her fiancé to return, she became eager to

Jing-Mei did not believe in herself as much as her mother did. In the text, it states, “It was not the only disappointment my mother felt in me. In the years that followed, I failed her many times.” This quote shows how the differences between the viewpoints of Jing-Mei and her mother caused them to more and more separate from each other. Because of the viewpoint of Jing-Mei’s mother, Jing-Mei stopped believing in herself and started to fail everything.

However, as their early relationship continued, Shen Fu found that Yün was able to analyze and debate literature and poetry with him. (Fu: 31) Shen Fu soon realized that Yün was as capable as he was, but held back by their society. He recounts a time

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.

This connection begins with the comprehension of her name and her sisters’ names. “Jing” means pure and “Mei” means little sister. Instantly Jing-mei feels more Chinese because she sees the connection she as to the language through her name. “Suyuan” means long cherished wish. With the understanding of her mother’s name, her feeling of connection to her Chinese heritage dramatically expands (Norton 190). She begins to piece the puzzle of her heritage together. By understanding the meaning of their names she begins to understand and accept her Chinese heritage. Her connection to her mother’s Chinese past is now much stronger than she had once realized.

Another aspect of cultural conflict is that humility and obedient are considered as the traditional virtues of the Chinese culture. Children should unconditionally obey their parents because parents have the ability and willingness to teach and control their children. For example, according to Jing-mei’s mother, Jing-mei has to practice piano assiduously. She would not be punished if she devotes all her effort to playing piano. We can clearly see this point in her mother’s word in the quarrel, “Only two kinds of daughters, those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind! Only one kind of daughter can live in this house. Obedient daughter” (461). But Jing-mei cannot understand this, because she is not familiar to Chinese culture. As a consequence of Jing-mei cannot understand her mother, she does not cooperate and has rebellious attitude against her mother. In the story, Jing-mei decided, “I didn’t have to do what my mother said anymore. I wasn’t her slave. This wasn’t China. I had listened to her before and look what happened. She was the stupid one” (460). As described above, Jing-mei cannot understand the humility and obedient of Chinese culture, even they are recognized as the

Jing-Mei feels differently though, “Unlike my mother, I did not believe I could be anything I wanted to. I could only be me,” (359/80) and she was correct for she had no natural musical talent. Jing-Mei has a desire to please her mother, but an even stronger one to choose her own life. She pacifies her mother by going to piano lessons but puts in no effort. Jing-Mei is “…determined to put a stop to her blind foolishness,” (356/48) but her mother’s desire to create a prodigy to compete with Aunt Lindo’s daughter, keeps her focused on the impossible. That is, until Jing-Mei escalates this conflict to its breaking point in rebellion. Stunning her mother, she shouts “Then I wish I’d never been born! I wish I were dead! Like them,” (359/77) referring to the twin daughters her mother lost in China. Sadly, the mother’s desire to have Jing-Mei conform to her expectations creates a constant battle between mother and daughter, and, in rejecting those expectations, seeing disappointment in her mother’s face all too often causes Jing-Mei to feel, “something inside me began to die” (353/18).

In this time in China, the role that women and men had were very different from each other. Women were expected to be quite, obedient, and respectful. While men were the provider, the intellectual and the decision maker in the family. In Shen Fu and his wife, Yun marriage it started out like the typical relationship in eightieth century China, each one fulfilling the roles that society had in place for them. But as they became to know each other more, Shen Fu saw Yun real personality and wanted someone to experience life, so he started to encourage her to be herself and told her she didn’t have to live up to this gender stereotypes for women. They both were always

After leaving Shanghai, Liusu stays in a hotel in Hong Kong and spends more and more time with Liuyuan. The two of them develop a relationship but their intentions are different. For Liusu, getting close to Liuyuan was a way for her to leave the Bai family. Liuyuan, on the other hand is seeking spiritual love. He professes his love for her on many occasions, but she rejects him each time. Her goal in being in a relationship with Liuyuan is to have security and Liuyuan’s words hold no meaning to her, but instead are examples of his playboy behavior:

"Don 't say things like that," said Jingyan. Deep inside, he knew Xia Jiang was a man of impulse. He 'd been humiliated today and his wrath would descend on anything he could access, in the most violent and bloody way possible. Jingyan 's guess of how many people Xia Jiang would slaughter in vengeance was staggering.

Born and raised to a wealthy family of high social standings in Taiwan, Yinghong, although well-educated, was still raised to uphold the traditional values of a Taiwanese woman. In fact, the reason why Lin Xigeng was attracted to Yinghong in the first place was because she was born to the Zhu Clan. At their first meeting, Yinghong described Lin Xigeng as having a “surprised look” on his face, which was indicative that “she had caught his attention” (24). Lin Xigeng was surprised due to the fact that even though it may seem like Yinghong’s appearance at a businessmen’s dinner was nothing out of the norm due to her education and family background, it was still irregular for a woman to appear at one of those dinners unless they are identified as someone whose job was to keep the