Mother Daughter Relationships - Family Relations in Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club

Being that she was adopted, she has no relation to her Chinese culture, yet still wants to belong to it. I feel she is judged because she lacks connection with her culture, and that is why she has this sense of determination to learn more

Four Chinese mothers have migrated to America. Each hope for their daughter’s success and pray that they will not experience the hardships faced in China. One mother, Suyuan, imparts her knowledge on her daughter through stories. The American culture influences her daughter, Jing Mei, to such a degree that it is hard for Jing Mei to understand her mother's culture and life lessons. Yet it is not until Jing Mei realizes that the key to understanding who her

 In the Joy Luck Club, the author Amy Tan, focuses on mother-daughter relationships. She examines the lives of four women who emigrated from China, and the lives of four of their American-born daughters. The mothers: Suyuan Woo, An-Mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-Ying St. Clair had all experienced some life-changing horror before coming to America, and this has forever tainted their perspective on how they want their children raised. The four daughters: Waverly, Lena, Rose, and Jing-Mei are all Americans. Even though they absorb some of the traditions of Chinese culture they are raised in America and American ideals and values.  This inability to communicate and the clash

   "I have already experienced the worst. After this, there is no worst possible thing" (Amy Tan 121). Throughout The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan tells stories of how mothers use the misfortunes in their lives, to try to teach their daughters about life. Many of the mothers had bad experiences in their pasts and do not want to see their daughters live through the same types of problems. They try to make their daughters' lives as easy and problem free as possible. However, the daughters do not see this as an act of love, but rather as an act of control. In the end, the daughters realize that their mothers tried to use their experiences to teach them not to give up hope, and to look at

Over there nobody will look down on her, because I will make her speak only perfect American English.  And over there she will always be too full to swallow any sorrow!  She will know my meaning because I will give her this swan- a creature that became more than what was hoped for.”  (Tan 1)  The culture in China the mothers of Joy Luck dealt with was unlike anything their daughters could ever imagine or appreciate. Between the mothers Lindo, Suyuan, An-mei and Ying-ying, the Chinese culture forced them into being married by a matchmaker, giving up babies, witness desperate attempts to save loved ones, and having an abortion.  In many ways the Chinese culture scared each woman, although they were proud of their heritage, their daughters deserved better.  These four mothers had very high hopes for the better lives that they wanted to give their daughters by raising them in America.  They didn’t like or want to have their daughters looked down upon, just because they were Chinese women.  From each of their own experiences, they learned that they wanted to improve the lives of their following generation.

Amy Chua has two daughters, to which she raised in a traditional Chinese way, strict. Very strict. Her daughters weren’t allowed sleepovers, television, arts and crafts, no ability to express their minds creatively. With the exception being piano. Second best wasn’t allowed, if you weren’t first, then you were last. Not being the best would result in punishment of correcting your failures hours on end. In the hope that, these painstaking hours would result in regaining success. School was at utmost importance, and being years ahead of other classmates was expected. If expectations weren’t met,

The concept of consent and descent is used throughout literature to show tension between cultures. Descent relates to the nation or culture that one or one’s family comes from. Consent shows a relation to the culture that is chosen, even though it may not be the one that someone is born into; consent may also be seen as Americanizing. One’s ethnic identity may be torn between the concepts of consent and descent. The culture of descent may conflict with the culture of consent. The contradictory ideologies might cause an inner struggle because these two components of identity. Within The Joy Luck Club, the Chinese heritage is the culture of descent and the American lifestyle is the culture of consent.

In the story “Two Kinds”, author Amy Tan, who is a Chinese-American, describes the conflicts in the relationship of a mother and daughter living in California. The protagonist in this story Jing-mei Woo’s mother is born and raised in China, and immigrates to the United States to escape from the Chinese Civil War. For many years she maintained complete Chinese traditional values, and has been abided by it deliberately. This kind of traditional Chinese culture has also affected her daughter profoundly. However, Jing-mei is born and raised in the United States. Despite she has a Chinese mother; she is unfamiliar and uncomfortable with Chinese

(insert hook here) For several immigrant families, parents’ goals and their children’s hopes for being happy are in conflict with one another. In the book The Joy Luck Club, written by Amy Tan, the story is a tale of the clashing relationship and dreams between Chinese immigrant mothers and their American-born daughters. As a result of language barriers, communicating thoughts between each other is very difficult and leads to misunderstanding each other’s needs. Tan conveys to her readers that unhealthy relationships between parents and their children can emerge from excessive parental pressure, which is caused by clashing ideas and backgrounds.

Amy Chua takes a “Chinese” approach to child rearing. At the epicenter of this parenting model is the drive for success. She states: “What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you’re good at it” (Chua2011). This attitude is shown in her views of academic success. Chua states: “Chinese parents can order their kids to get straight As. Western parents can only ask their kids to try their best. Chinese parents can say, "You 're lazy. All your classmates are getting ahead of you" (Chua 2011). Hanna Rosin by contrast takes the “Western” approach on her views of academic success. In fact she makes the statement: “What privileged American children need is not more skills and rules and math drills. They need to lighten up and roam free, to express themselves in ways not dictated by their uptight, over-invested parents” (Rosin 2011). Hanna Rosin does not believe that success is not important in children’s lives; however, she does

How bitter the words were! If a child never get mother’s acclaim and encouragement, how sorrowful one’s heart feels! Here comes a contrasting comparison of western and Chinese parenting—western parents encourage and praise their child much more often than Chinese parents do. This encouragement helps them create new ideas, independent opinions, developing unique and sparkling characters. Whereas Chinese parents believe in the old saying, “a strict teacher produces outstanding students”, strictness and criticism are important educating guide lines for Chinese parents, which results in obedience and collectivism, compromise, no psyche and no guts to say no. But on the other hand, Chinese do behave better in harsh and high-pressured condition due to their strict training in childhood.

A good mother-daughter relationship is beneficial for both the mother and the daughter. This definitely comes into play in Amy Tan’s novel titled “The Joy Luck Club.” The story is about four sets of Chinese mothers and daughters, and their first experience of growing in America. All of the mothers want to raise their children in the traditional Chinese way and still allow them to be all that they can be in America. This causes many conflicts between them when the daughters act too American and the mothers act too Chinese. There are also problems when some of the daughters grow and get married to American Men. The mothers influence the daughters with stories of ancestors

Amy Tan is an American Born Chinese, daughter of immigrants, and her family shares many features with the families depicted in her novels. Tan's novels offer some glimpses of life in China while developing the themes of mother-daughter relations, cultural adaptation and "women with a past".  Tan’s novels share many themes and elements, but this paper will focus mainly on two episodes of the novel The Joy Luck Club: "The Joy Luck Club" and "Waiting Between the Trees"; and will make references to The Kitchen's God Wife and The Hundred Secret Senses.

“But inside you must be always Chinese. You must be proud you are different. Your only shame is to have shame.” Amy realized the meaning of her mother’s words: “For

mother, Suyuan, however, insists that she is truly Chinese and is convinced that this side of her