Language Techniques In Tim O 'Brien's Still My Mother'

The implementation of language techniques on characterisation help drive the story forward by highlighting the protagonist’s familial values to appraise the strong interpersonal connections between the people within the protagonist’s internal world.
Although family have much in common, it is also common that you may have disagreements or disputes among each other. In POTB, when Hang and her mum had a quarrel on contradicting thoughts and beliefs. Hang walks away to be alone to process their dispute and has a thought “In spite of everything…and in spite of it all, she was still my mother” (pg172). Through the use of anaphora, Huong depicts that fact that even though Hang’s mum irritated Hang, Hang didn’t get those feelings to overtake her values on family. It depicts the daughter’s unconditional love for her mother by repeating the phrase “In spite of...”, it emphasises that despite the fact that in all of this dissension, Hang puts her values of respect and unequivocal love first and shows her point that no matter

After her grandma dies, Mikage finds a liking to kitchens and loves to spend a lot of her time as it reminds her of all the wonderful memories she had with family before. Since she finds comfort in there and it is also what people seek from their families too, Yoshimoto is metaphorically representing the kitchen as Mikage’s family and because of that, the author trying to say that Mikage enjoys and cherishes family bonding. When Yuichi’s mum dies, Mikage seeks relief in the Kitchen again as it is a place of hope for her. She is reminded of “That one summer of bliss. In that kitchen.” (pg59) when she spent summer with Yuichi and Yuichi’s mum. Thus, the memory she has valued and cherished with her new family gives power to her in times of adversity or