Normality In Amy Tan's Fish Cheeks

A “normal person” can be considered many different things, depending on the viewpoint of the person. Often times one would consider a “normal person” to be a person without any sort of mental illness. A normal person is someone who adapts to the norms and standards of society.

Teenagers usually have a distorted perspective which differs from an adult’s causing teens to be self-centered rather than other-centered, this story explores that view and how the teen in the story was able to change. “Fish Cheeks,” by Amy Tan, is an autobiographical narrative following fourteen year old Amy Tan and her experience at a Christmas Eve dinner after her father invites the minister and his son, Robert, who was Amy’s crush at the time. As I was reading the story I was able to learn how Amy went from being self-centered to other-centered causing her to fully appreciate her mother’s lesson, and some of the ways I could improve myself based on Amy’s situation.

Amy Tan recounts her experience of a disastrous Christmas dinner with her and the minister’s family. Her crush Robert is there and he makes her feel ashamed of her family’s actions and traditions. In the short story Fish Cheeks by Amy Tan, a young girl is embarrassed of her Chinese heritage but grows more confident after a disastrous dinner.

Well-known author Amy Tan, in her short narrative “Fish Cheeks”, writes about the embarrassment she has because of her culture and ethnicity. She talks about this when a white father and his son, Robert, whom she likes, want to come over her house, and as a chinese-american young woman, she is a little ashamed of the chinese food. She also is ashamed by the type of house and environment she lives in.

Conformity is a concept that has been heavily researched in the field of social psychology. Conformity is defined as a change in behavior, beliefs, and attitudes due to group pressure perceived as real (encompassing the presence of others) or imagined (encompassing the pressure of social standards) (Myers, 2010, p. 192). The concept of conformity is a powerful influence on the tendency for people to arrange their thoughts, perspectives, and ideas with others, especially when in a group. This takes away from a person’s individuality because they want to feel accepted by others and therefore, a person will accomplish this basic need of approval through conforming.

As I transitioned from elementary school to middle school, I have always heard about everyone trying to fit in. For me, I too have experienced trying to fit in. While others tried to fit in by buying the trendiest clothes, listening to the latest music or playing the newest games, I thought I could fit in by just going along with everything people said. However, because of this, in the long run, I began to lose myself.

The article “The Case for Fitting In” compares to my idea of conformity because I think that it means how you change your opinion due to social pressure. My idea of conformity relates to the article because it was talking about how when people were in a group and someone said the wrong answer they usually went with it. “Each subject saw 18 sets of lines, and the group answer was wrong for 12 of them” this proves that most of the time people went with the group rather than going with their personal opinion. I think that the article really compares with my definition of conformity because I think that it causes you to change your opinion and sometimes causes you to choose wrong answers. I also strongly think that the article agrees with me because

The psychologists Deutsch and Gerard said when it comes to social norms there are two theories. The first theory is that if you have a lack of information about something we usually do what the majority of the class/group are doing for example if you are waiting to cross the road and you don 't see the traffic signals changing because someone is in your way but you start to cross because everyone else is crossing even though you don 't know it is safe to cross. The second theory is that we conform to a group of people so we feel accepted by acting how they act or the way they dress. For example if I left the uniformed public service course and joined a art course in the college that they were all wearing a particular type of clothing eventually I would conform to the way they dress so I feel a part of the group the same in the public service you will conform to them so you fell accepted in the team.

“Living in society, we are under constant pressure to surrender our individuality to the will of the majority, the school, the workplace, the family, etc.” (Feys, P.6). Logan Feys, the author of “The Sociology of Leopard Man”, states that society is persistently under pressure to change our individual likings, personality, change the way we look, etc. to feel accepted and approved by society. The desire to fit in and not be an outsider with social groups causes people to feel pressured and change themselves to fit in. Fey’s statement is correct that people conform with society to not be an outsider or avoid the fear of possibly being an outsider.

We must decide for ourselves whether to conform to such a social etiquette. We are taught as soon as we are old enough to grasp the idea that it is bad to be unique and to avoid being different. At some point, however, we must decide within ourselves whether to spend every day trying to be like everyone else because society says we should or living each day true to ourselves. Our strength as a person is proven through what we decide. The benefits of being true to ourselves greatly outweigh any negative aspects of choosing that path.

To understand why we have a sense of conformity, we must first understand value. “Values are used to learn people’s culture, ideas, and what they want out of life (Henslin 49). Every culture has similar and different values. “Norms are the expectations a group develops concerning the ‘right’ way to reflects its values” (Henslin49). An example of a norm would be personal space and speaking quietly in certain places such as a library. When norms are violated people often begin to question the person’s sanity and well-being based on how extreme the norm violation was.

People do many different things in attempt to fit in, even while wanting to make a difference. However, that person could be too afraid to do so, and instead go along with the crowd. This is conformity, trying to blend in with society just because they’re too afraid to speak out. A person can live a fulfilled life by not conforming to society’s standards and opinions, and by living their life bravely.

Many things are important to us, one of these is being accepted by our society. We all hate to be the outsider or the new kid, because we feel alone and secluded . In “Who Am I This Time?';, Helene Shaw’s job kept her moving to a different town every eight weeks. She became very cold to her

What is considered normal? Everyone today yearns to be considered normal, but what exactly are they striving for? Found in the dictionary, the definition of normal is: an adjective; usual; conforming to the usual standard, type, or custom. But, how can anything be considered normal if no two people are exactly the same?         Norms form a society. They are the standards by which people live by. Growing up in Rhode Island, my experience has been with the American contemporary society. Our society has to put labels on everything and everyone in order to function. There are different norms for the way we look and act. Our society has set an extremely high standard of normality with appearance. People believe that the norm for appearance,

In all aspects of the lives we live, normal can not ever be defined as a single idea. If normal is such a thing at all, it is a subjective opinion and can only be defined on an individual level. Everything we interpret is relative to our upbringing and our environment. Not one person had the same upbringing or lived in the same environment as another person for even siblings who have lived together their whole lives have different nurturing experiences. The differentiation between normal and abnormal is a topic of much debate. The meaning of normality varies in many ways such as by person, time, place, situation, culture and set of values. Normality is usually seen as good and desirable by society and what society thinks while abnormality may be seen as bad or undesirable (Boundless).