Mother Tongue

Tan includes multiple anecdotes throughout the essay to further her argument in many ways. Tan’s argument is that the use of English can be interpreted in many ways and also change the way people think of a person. When she includes them it allows for readers to relate to her in different ways and it shows that she has many facts to support her claims with real-life experience. Tan references to a time she gave a speech and realized that she uses many different types of English depending on who she is with. She remembered that her mother was listening to the speech she was giving and probably did not understand any of it due

Furthermore, Tan's mother teaches her to think in a different manner than the other children in her school. Tan states that her developing language skills were influenced by her family and in this case her mother, hence it affected her

Tan shows that she is embarrassed in her family for their lacking of proper American manners. Although at the time she felt ashamed, the words spoken by her mother, “Inside you must always be Chinese. You must be proud you are different. Your only shame is to have shame” became better understood later in life. In Amy Tan's work, the strong use of description of both the event that are occurring and Amy’s feelings about them, draws the reader in and makes them feel as if they are part of the action. Tan's Chinese-American culture and life stories are imprinted in her writing which gives the reader an opportunity to gain knowledge about the way of life in her family, friends, and even the Chinese culture. Tan's main purpose of writing is to inform and educate people about growing up as a minority in the American society.

On the other hand the main focus on Tan’s story is to show the beautiful and passionate side of her mother that people can't see. Tan describes how all of the English’s that she grew up with, normal English and "mother tongue" English, has shaped her first outlook of life. She writes, "But to me, my mother's

Mother Tongue is a story that describes how Amy Tan’s mother was treated unfairly because of her “broken English”. As the second generation of Chinese immigrants, Tan faces more problems than her peers do. Her mom, who speaks “limited” English, needs Tan to be her “translator” in order to communicate with the native English speakers. Tan has felt ashamed of her mother “broken” language at first. She then contemplates her background affected her life and her study. However, she changes her thought at the end since she realizes things behind language might be more valuable than language itself sometimes. Through the various different literary devices and rhetorical strategies such as the ethos, pathos, and logos appeals, as well as a

She wants the audience to know right away that even though she is about to tell you the story of a difficult childhood, she did reach her goal in the end. After making this statement, Tan dives into her past and how she came to be where she is today. Her mother is the next most important point of discussion. Her mother influenced her writing style as well as her beliefs about her culture and heritage. ?Just last week, I was walking down the street with my mother, and I again found myself conscious of the English I was using, the English I do use with her? (Tan, 2002, p. 36). The broken up English her mother uses is the next issue Tan focuses on. ??everything is limited, including people?s perceptions of the limited English speaker? (Tan, 2002, p. 36). Lastly, she talks about her education and the role it had on her deciding what she wanted to do with her life. ?Fortunately, I happen to be rebellious in nature and enjoy the challenge of disproving assumptions made about me? (Tan, 2002, p. 39). By structuring the essay in order of importance, Tan reinforces her message that you can be anything you desire even with a different culture than the norm.

She also incorporates problem and solution when she is describing how she had to talk for her mother. Her belief is that people will not take you seriously if you do not speak proper English, and to prove this, she shows how her mother encountered that kind of attitude often. Tan describes how she had to call the stockbroker because her mother was concerned about not getting a check, and how the hospital would not look for a lost CAT scan until Tan was called to mediate. Even though the mother speaks English, Tan still needs to act as a translator.

In order to tighten her persuasion, Tan shows the consequence of people judging her mother’s English through the rhetorical device-cause and effect. In her early years of writing, Tan uses great English and plethora of vocabularies to prove that she possesses the ability of a scholar writer. “And at first I wrote using what I thought to be wittily crafted sentences, sentences that would finally prove I had mastery over the English language” (637). Tan said she was trying to disprove people’s assumption about her writing talent. However, Tan, herself, was

As an adult, Tan understands that her mother’s English is the language of intimacy. She now understands that her “mother’s expressive command belies how much she actually understands” Her mother reads “The Wall street Journal” and converses with their stockbroker on matters Tan doesn’t comprehend. It becomes evident that her initial

Am i Tan, Writer burn in U.S daughter of Chinise parents. In her essay "Mother Tongue" she establishes her mother's limits within society because of her "broken" English and also how her mother English help her see the world differently. In paragraph 7 she writes how some of her friends only understand 50% of what she was

Amy Tan?s purpose in the essay is to inform and express her beliefs and new discovery of the language of intimacy. She wants to provide this new innovation of language and closeness it creates within the family atmosphere. She wants to acknowledge that people who speak broken English are often misrepresented by their tongue as being a dense individual; an unintelligent person. This is a very common misconception by people; don?t let the language fool you. Providing the subjective point of view, it is clear that Amy feels very strong and passionate with the connection to her mother. She has a very strong advantage that

She used to yield at her mother’s broker because he didn’t send a check to her mom on time. She was talking to her mother’s doctor when he forgot to give her mom a CAT scan. Mother’s English had an effect on limiting her daughter possibilities in life. It affected Tan’s results on IQ exams, achievement test, and the SAT. Tan was getting “B” and sometimes “B” pluses.

This dialect, Tan says, became their "language of intimacy, a different sort of English that relates to family talk, the language [she] grew up with" (Tan 589). This type of language creates an identity for Tan, one which she was ashamed of growing up. This feeling of shame later backfired as an adult in her fiction writing. She wrote to prove she had "mastery over the English language" with large words, unheard of to the common ear, and sentences she thought were "wittily crafted." But as Tan matured, she realized she should envision an audience for her stories; this audience was her mother. She began to write stories using "all the Englishes" she grew up with. As she found out, this change of her own conception of language enriched her writing and added to her ethos. After all, her mother’s language, as she heard it, was "vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery." "That was the language that had helped shaper the way [she] saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world" (Tan 590). Her "mother tongue" is her identity as a writer, and she learned that someone’s English does not reflect the quality of what he/she has to say.

This strong exchange is large basis for argument of the misinterpreted attempts of each character. Tan herself is only trying to be do her best as her mother wants, even though her mother thinks that she is not trying as much as she really can.

As Tan was growing up, the discourse she utilized as a part of her family condition influenced her outcomes on different tests at school. Several other Asian Americans had this comparative issue, and had instructors "who are guiding them far from composing into math and science, which is the thing that happened to me(Tan)."(Tan 64) This is on the grounds that Math has just a single right answer, while English was a "matter of supposition and individual experience."(Tan 63) thus, Tan drove herself to contradict others presumptions and turned into an English major. She wrote in an approach to demonstrate her "influence" over the English language. An illustration she gives is this line, altered