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Essays on reading comprehension
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Essays on reading comprehension
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Amy Tan’s short story called “Mother Tongue”, reminded me of my personal life experience, that I'm going through right now, this short story made me start to read the whole book of “Mother Tongue “, because I think in Tan’s book we have similar thoughts about the power of language. People’s do not take seriously the person’s problem who is with broken language. Also, everybody has their own mother tongue that they grow up with. In addition, parents with no perfect English has effects of their kids life. Most of the people around us who speaks good English doesn't take difficulties serious of people who can't express their thoughts, because of their low English or language. People don't know how to communicate with people who with lower levels of English, or language. For example, Tan’s mother went to the hospital for an appointment to find out about …show more content…
And also, they said they would not give her any more information until the next appointment. And Tan's mother told them that she needs her daughter who is in perfect English, they had assurances the CAT scan would be found, promises that conference call on Monday would be held, and apologize for any suffering. This example shows that the power of a language, and people's action to a person who speak good English and who has limited English. Also, this example connects with my life experience, back then I didn’t have perfect English, once when I went to pharmacy for certain drug, I asked for help and tried to explain what kind of drug I was looking for, and they told me to wait, and I waited hours people who
The conclusions that can be drawn based on the two articles are similar as well. Both articles seem to conclude that language shouldn’t be a barrier for those who do not have a complete grasp of it. Baca wishes that those who are illiterate would try to learn to write because writing can help unleash emotions, while Tan wants people to understand that her mother is not disabled, but rather enriched with her knowledge of English. Both arguments that are presented are convincing. These arguments can appeal to a wide range of people and motivate the general public to be more understanding.
Tan also reflects on how her broken English with whom she shares with her mother is her mother tongue, and how this broken English has shaped who she is today. I am able to identify with Tan’s feelings as my grandmother who is a native Puerto Rican, has her own “mother tongue” as she still speaks in broken English. After my mother passed away when I was three, my grandmother moved in to help raise my sisters and I as we were very young. My grandmother used the same broken English Tan’s mother’s had used and my feelings towards it mirrored Tan’s at an early age. I remember because my father worked during the day my grandmother had to attend parent teacher conferences in his place. As I was still too young, my grandmother dragged me along and made me wait outside. We had waited in line for about two hours before finally being called for my conference. After a few minutes in, one of my teachers walks outside of the classroom and asks me if I know Spanish, to which I reply no. As the teacher walks back into the room I hear a resounding “Ma’am we must reschedule…there are other parents waiting and we cannot understand you, and we are pretty sure you
In the article, Tan furthers her point when she states that her mother, someone who uses a "broken" dialect, can do several things that the author herself struggles with, and does so despite what people
Both the brains and the hearts of the audience have been convinced. She also used many rhetorical strategies, like emotional appeal to convey her rough childhood to the reader. She gave numerous examples of being discriminated, and stereotyped because of their race. Tan’s audience reaches out to family members who speak broken English. Amy Tan also comprehends that although people may not be able to speak perfect English, they can comprehend what others are saying, and that you shouldn't discriminate others because of their race. A persons understanding of someone who speaks “broken-English” could be very limited, but the wisdom of the “broken English” speaker is
In my life I have seen how even while speaking the same language there can be communication problems. Adding the inability to speck the same language and then the complexity of describing medical conditions, I can see how the situation could turn out poorly and cause troubling effects. This chapter has helped me better understand why the Hmon...
Despite growing up amidst a language deemed as “broken” and “fractured”, Amy Tan’s love for language allowed her to embrace the variations of English that surrounded her. In her short essay “Mother Tongue”, Tan discusses the internal conflict she had with the English learned from her mother to that of the English in her education. Sharing her experiences as an adolescent posing to be her mother for respect, Tan develops a frustration at the difficulty of not being taken seriously due to one’s inability to speak the way society expects. Disallowing others to prove their misconceptions of her, Tan exerted herself in excelling at English throughout school. She felt a need to rebel against the proverbial view that writing is not a strong suit of someone who grew up learning English in an immigrant family. Attempting to prove her mastery of the English language, Tan discovered her writing did not show who she truly was. She was an Asian-American, not just Asian, not just American, but that she belonged in both demographics. Disregarding the idea that her mother’s English could be something of a social deficit, a learning limitation, Tan expanded and cultivated her writing style to incorporate both the language she learned in school, as well as the variation of it spoken by her mother. Tan learned that in order to satisfy herself, she needed to acknowledge both of her “Englishes” (Tan 128).
The problem started with her mother because she spoke broken English. She had a hard time during her life when she moved to the US because she couldn’t speak English well. The first reason was mixed the English with Chinese, and they used code. The family didn’t practice the language. On one day Amy Tan 's mother exposed to a lot of attitude and that’s bothering her because when she spoke to the native speaker some people understood 50% and the other did not understand her. Since she wants to order something they didn’t give her a nice service, or tried to ignore her, but Amy Tan always tried to fix the problem for her mother because she can speak the English clearly. Amy Tan 's mother felt depressing and Her daughter decided to make her mother glad, so she made a huge deal for her mother because she made her mother tried to speak English by explaining the English words to Chinese, and that’s made the English for her mother more easily just to be in touched with the American people. Even Amy Tan 's mother was struggling with English, but she plain in her life goal that’s mean nothing impossible to do it, and everything from learning could be possible. If anyone would something they
I find it quite interesting to know how the author Ann Tan, has somewhat of a turn on and off switch. For instance, she stated in the beginning paragraphs of “Mother Tongue,” how she embraces the “power of language.” The author invites us into her world, giving us a clear picture of her own personal experiences that she encounters with the variations of languages. The author talked about the experience she had with her mother being in the room while giving a speech to a large group of people. According to the author, her speech was “filled with carefully wrought grammatical phrases,” the English language she had never spoken to her mother. The author also admits how she finds herself speaking what she later calls in the essay, “broken English,” to her mother and sometimes her husband. Why? Because this was the primary language used
The audience Tan is reaching are people who are very ignorant to the fact that others who speak broken English, regardless of race, know that they are taken advantage of and are not given the respect that a fluent English speaking person would get. The essay is also aimed toward people who can relate to the ?language of intimacy? (36), which is a different sort of English ...
English is an invisible gate. Immigrants are the outsiders. And native speakers are the gatekeepers. Whether the gate is wide open to welcome the broken English speakers depends on their perceptions. Sadly, most of the times, the gate is shut tight, like the case of Tan’s mother as she discusses in her essay, "the mother tongue." People treat her mother with attitudes because of her improper English before they get to know her. Tan sympathizes for her mother as well as other immigrants. Tan, once embarrassed by her mother, now begins her writing journal through a brand-new kaleidoscope. She sees the beauty behind the "broken" English, even though it is different. Tan combines repetition, cause and effect, and exemplification to emphasize her belief that there are more than one proper way (proper English) to communicate with each other. Tan hopes her audience to understand that the power of language- “the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth”- purposes to connect societies, cultures, and individuals, rather than to rank our intelligence.
Amy Tan tries to spread a non-discriminatory message through her words; telling not judge people based on the way he/she speaks a language. Amy Tan also tries to impose her idea of language bringing people closer. The “broken” English that she invented, just like many immigrants, brought her closer to her mother, even though she was looked down upon in her community due to her ability to speak fluently. This is seen when she had to speak to a doctor when her mother was diagnosed with brain tumor and the doctor told her they had lost the CAT scans. The doctor at this moment was not cooperating with her mother due to her inability to speak English properly. When Amy finally talked to the doctor they were able to find the results and had to give her an apology. This along with many other examples in the essay show how Amy had to help her mother out to get her message across. Using pathos in her stories, Amy Tan is able to connect deeply with those who have encountered such people that speak “broken” English or have judged others in the past. This also makes the audience sympathize for
Amy Tan is the author of the essay Mother Tongue. In this essay, she explains how the power of language has influenced her life through her mother and the experiences they have had together concerning her mother's English-speaking ability, or lack there of. She was born into a Chinese family where both Chinese and English were spoken. She is sensitive to and accepting of people's lingual differences. She talks about how the inability to speak English well in America gives others the wrong impression: "...everything is limited, including people's perceptions of the limited English speaker" (Tan 13). She is saying here that prolific English speakers place limitations on people who have limited English-speak...
Tan was born to a pair of Chinese immigrants. Her mother understood English extremely well, but the English she spoke was “broken.”(36) Many people not familiar with her way of speaking found it very difficult to understand her. As a result of this, Tan would have to pretend to be her mother, and she called people up to yell at them while her mother stood behind her and prompted her. This caused Tan to be ashamed of her mother throughout her youth, but as she grew, she realized that the language she shares with her mother is a “language of intimacy” (36) that she even uses when speaking with her husband.
Limitations of a person's language affects his or her communication with other individuals. The inability to speak with conciseness results in a change in perspective towards another person. Tan reflects on an interaction between her mother, who speaks with “broken” English, and her mother's doctor:
The narrator also explains about her mother's limited English and broken English which made the narrator to learn mistakes that her mother did during the CAT scan and the phone call with the stockbroker for her mother's money check. All the mistakes done by her mother make her daughter learn in her young age about how to talk and write better English. “The Mother tongue “ generally focus on the immigrants like Amy Tan ,she explain that “ Asian student, as a whole, always do significantly better on math achievement test than in English” ( Tan 179). who was a Asian-American whose maths and science were good but her mother tongue grammar is different than the English grammar, and then they face problem in the English. Tan’s mom also face the same problem as other immigrants faced the problem of Imperfect English due to their mother tongue.