"Mother Tongue"

In Amy Tan’s memoir, "Mother Tongue," (2016), she asserts that all the Englishes she grew up with helped shape her as a writer.  She explains this by recalling her experience with her mother’s simple English and her own more refined style of English. The author wrote "Mother Tongue" to explain to people how the different Englishes she grew up with, even the “broken” one, eventually became an important part of her writing.  Tan was targeting aspiring writers when she wrote this.

  "Mother Tongue" was a very heartwarming story to read.  The part when Amy Tan talked about how she thought her mother’s broken English reflected broken thoughts, and then later went on to explain how this isn’t actually true was very well said in our opinion.  It was also very interesting to hear her explain the way society looked at her mother’s broken English compared to her own more refined English.  The part that was really inspiring, though, was when she explained how she was expected to have a career in math or science but instead pursued a writing career.  Overall, the story was very engaging, and it did a good job at showing that just because people think you can’t do something doesn’t mean it’s true.  It was very inspiring.  

Amy Tan, writer of "Mother Tongue," does her best to show us that, as people, we can only exhibit what we are familiar with. Tan explained that as a child growing up in a Chinese American home, She was taught by her surroundings. There was a specific way that her family spoke with each other, and it worked for them. Language was never seen as a barrier by Tan until she noticed the way people reacted to how her mother spoke. No one ever took her mother seriously simply because of her vernacular. This goes to show that society plays a part in our early development.  Being exposed to the opinions of others affects us, whether it be positive or negative. Tan then began to grow embarrassed of her mother's ‘broken’ English, even though she could understand her perfectly. She explained that her mom's speech coupled with the opinions of many started to shape her future.  It was perceived that she would also display this kind of limited English, so her teachers pushed her towards the fields of math and science. However, tan defied this push and started pursuing a career in writing. It was always evident that Tan was a good English speaker, but even as an adult she found herself talking to her mother with the same ‘simple speech’ she was around when growing up. Long story short, Amy Tan used her own experiences to show that even though we eventually become our own unique selves, parts of our upbringing will never leave us.