Mothers have a unique ability to see their daughters. They see them in a way no one else does. Often what a daughter perceives as her mother’s opinion is really not how she feels at all. The mothers in Joy Luck Club see more then what is on the surface of their daughters, they see inside them. As An-mei Hsu tells her daughter “A mother is best. A mother knows what is inside you” (Tan 188). The mothers in the Joy Luck Club want more for their daughters then the daughters realize. Ying-ying wants her daughter to have a more honest, less passive relationship then she had with her husband and she believes that Lena deserves it. The section American Translation opens with a short story which shows a mother who sees in her daughter, not only the daughter, but the child she will have and the mother she will become. Her mother sees more than what is obvious. Lena’s mother does too. She sees that Lena’s life is currently “a room with no life in it” and that she and her husband spend too much time saying “words that mean nothing” (Tan 252).
As a child, Lena literally translated much of her parents’ life for them. Her father spoke little Chinese and her mother spoke only some English. Lena learned to translate so each parent would hear what she thought they wanted to hear (Tan 112). She never learned the way a husband and wife should really communicate and she carried this through to her marriage. Her one positive communication role model was their neighbor. For years, she thought their yelling and arguing ended in violence, until she finally realized their arguments were “shouting with love” (Tan 115). Her neighbors gave her hope that life would not be terrible, that people could find the good in each other.
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...able or their marriage could make it collapse. Harold pays no more attention to the fact that the table can collapse then he does to Lena and their marriage. When the table finally breaks, Lena’s mother’s comment is “fallen down” (Tan 165) just like Lena’s marriage.
Lena tells her mother that she knew the table would break and her mother asks the simple question “why you not stop it?” (Tan 165). Lena’s mother doesn’t want her to make the same mistake she made in not communicating with her husband. She knows that Lena could improve the foundation of her marriage by speaking up for herself. Years ago, Ying-ying became and “unseen spirit” (Tan 251) because of her first husband and she expects more from her daughter. Ying-ying sees that Lena can be more the “ghost” that you cannot see (Tan 163). Lena can create her own future, not just passively let it happen.
What a loving mother! Lena Younger, or Mama, is nurturing and supportive when it comes to raising and maintaining a family. Personally speaking, being nurturing means to love, care for, and show concern over someone. Analyzing Mama’s relationships with family members can show us her view on parenting and ultimately show us her devotion to her family. In A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry, Mama is a nurturing mother who cares for and protects her family in her struggle to keep them unified.
In “How The Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents” the author, Julia Alvarez develops the theme of overcoming obstacles through the technique of point of view and dialogue. One emotional and pivotal moment occurs in the middle of the book, when Yolanda describes her teenage years living in the U.S. She states, “We could smoke and no great aunt would smell us. - We began to develop a taste for the American good life, and soon, Island was an old hat.” (p.108). Additionally, a powerful example of dialogue is when Yolanda feels insecure about her heritage, and her fixed mindset about how love is support to be. She states, “I cursed my immigrant origins..” (p.94) Yolanda is frustrated with her given life, and feels like if she was an American, life
These types of external influences affect mothers outside the realm of short stories as well. Personal losses, economic struggles, remorseful guilt, and cultural background all influence the way a mother interacts with her daughter and the methods she employs to guide her down the path that leads to prosperity and success, however, a mother 's ultimate hope is that her daughter understands her value, appreciates her opportunities, and embraces moments of contentment.
Your slaps don’t stick, your kicks don’t hit, so, we remain the same.” Lena’s passive character and Harold’s self-absorption both contribute to their distancing from each other (“Your red eye sees nothing.”). They never make any progress in improving their marriage; they merely continue fighting for something that they both want and don’t have (“…so, we remain the
“A mother is she who can take the place of all others, but whose place no one else can take.” (Cardinal Mermillod). A mother plays an integral role within the entirety of the family unit, caring and nurturing the children, loving her spouse, and fulfilling her responsibilities in and out of the house. However, despite loving everyone in her family equally, a mother tends to form a unique and special bond with her daughter. Since before the times of Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley, Maria Theresa and Marie Antoinette, and even St. Anne and Mary the mother of God, the importance of the mother-daughter relationship is evident throughout history. The importance of this bond between mothers and daughters plays a key role in today’s society and acts as a common theme seen in literature. In her novel, The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan stresses the importance of a strong, functional mother-daughter relationship. The emphasis on the necessity of this relation presents itself through the bonds present in An Mei’s family.
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 between cultures create rifts between mothers and daughters.
Many women find that their mothers have the greatest influence on their lives and the way their strengths and weaknesses come together. In Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club, the lives of four Chinese mothers and their Chinese-American daughters are followed through vignettes about their upbringings and interactions. One of the mothers, An-Mei Hsu, grows up away from her mother who has become the 4th wife of a rich man; An-Mei is forced to live with her grandmother once her mother is banned from the house, but eventually reunites and goes to live in the man’s house with her mother. Her daughter, Rose, has married an American man, Ted, but their marriage begins to end as he files for divorce; Rose becomes depressed and unsure what to do, despite her mother’s advice. An-Mei has strengths and weaknesses that shape her own courageous actions, and ultimately have an influence on her daughter.
The language between a mother and a daughter can create a huge brick wall in their relationship because they have different views on life, and how they should handle it. In the book "The Joy Luck Club," by Amy Tan, a story is told of An-Mei Hus and her daughter Rose Hsu Jordan, who is going though a divorce. An- Mei wants her daughter, Rose, to try and save her marriage. But Rose knows it’s pointless to try and upon that she decides to learn to stick up for her self, get a lawyer, and fight her soon to be ex-husband for the house. The relationship between An-Mei Hsu and Rose Hsu Jordan shows that language is a brick wall, because they don’t understand why wants what they want. Rose doesn’t care to save her marriage; she only wants to get the house. When her mother, An-Mei, wants Rose to fight to save her marriage, because it’s the Chinese way, and how the only way to keep her honor among her family.
Helena Viramontes' short story, "Miss Clairol," takes the reader through a day in the life of Arlene, a single Hispanic mother, and her daughter, Champ. They begin their day at K-Mart in search for just the right beauty products for Arlene because she is going on a date that evening. After leaving without paying, they spend the day at home. Arlene prepares for the date while Champ assists her, watches television, and fixes herself dinner. Once Arlene is sufficiently fixed, she leaves for the date, ignoring Champ as she yells goodbye. Although I had to read "Miss Clairol" all the way through several times in order to develop a full understanding of the story and its purpose, I needed no extra reading to understand Arlene and my feelings about her. From the beginning of the story, my gut reaction to Arlene was disgust, and as I continued to read, my distaste only enlarged. Although I do not feel that Viramontes' sole purpose was to disturb the reader by her characterization of this single mother, that was what kept my attention from the moment she was introduced.
The films The Joy Luck Club (Wang, 1993) and The Story of Mothers and Daughters (Weimberg, 2010) portray various types of the mother daughter relationship. Through these mother and daughter relationships, both films focus on the tension and love in the older years of the daughters lives’ but The Story of Mothers and Daughters focus on the all of the stages of life.
The most heartbreaking way to destroy a precious relationship between mothers and daughters is when each party says something insensitive and callous, as described in Amy Tan’s story Two Kinds, “There are only two kinds of daughters. Those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind! Only one kind of daughter can live in this house. Obedient daughter!’” to which the daughter, Jing Mei, responds, “Then I wish I’d never been born! I wish I were dead! Like them” (294-295). Although the mother’s words are unkind, Jing Mei ultimately crosses the line, thus creating a fracture in their relationship that she believes will never be mended. In Jing Mei’s child perception, she believes that because her mother stops pushing her to play piano after this, she really wishes her two babies were here instead of Jing Mei. Jing Mei cannot begin to understand what an ideal mother is, because of the complexity of humans. Is a perfect mother someone who is overworked and thus absent or someone overbearing and a perfectionist or easily persuaded and thus unfair? In the stories: Two Kinds by Amy Tan, I Stand Here Ironing by Tillie Olsen, and Everyday Use by Alice Walker, the notion of reconciliation between mothers and daughters is explored. Forgiveness made through both daughters and mothers being able to understand and accept the reasoning behind a mother’s actions, which, as young girls, the daughters unfortunately misunderstood.
The mother-daughter relationship is often complex and confusing. Amy Tan explores this relationship with novel The Joy Luck Club narrated by four daughters and three mothers: Jing-mei Woo, Rose Hsu Jordan, Lena St. Clair, Waverly Jong, An-mei Jordan, Ying-Ying St. Clair, and Lindo Jong. June narrates in her late mother's place. The mothers talk about their difficult pasts in China and how they have been changed. The trauma from their past causes their daughters not to be able to connect to . The women are finally able to connect to each other. The women are forced to learn from the past, overcome adversity, and learn to understand one another.
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.
Let’s take a look at the dreams of Lena “mama” the matriarch of the family who is humble and yet proud and strong woman. And, like many
Our parents are not perfect. They brought us in this world to mold and shape us to the best of their abilities. The fact that remains is no matter whom our parents are, each one of them faces difficult obstacles when it comes to raising their children. “I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen portrays an excellent example of a mother who shares with us the emotional burden of the circumstances she was forced to contend with in order to raise her oldest daughter, Emily. We are sympathetic to the woes of the mother’s situation, the struggle to obtain a better way of life for her and her daughter. We empathize with Emily, and her endeavors to maintain a stable relationship with her mother. It seems these two characters’ lives were set up for failure from the beginning. As the story unfolds, through abandonment, illness, and long-absences, the mother shows regret for the path she chose despite there being no other option.