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Amy Tan Literacy Analysis

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Learning literacy is not something easily done or provided. Some individuals are given the opportunity easily and other have to face many obstacles to even get the chance to have the secondary discourse. Literacy is all around us and the fact that not every individual is able to succeed in the secondary discourse is what separates society. These discourses of which include only two, primary and secondary discourse. Primary discourse, meaning sources around you and secondary discourse, sources that teach you, for example teachers. And in conjunction with these discourses, groups in society will be divided accordingly.
To begin, literacy is something commonly seeked within an individual in today's society, in regards to knowing at least the basics …show more content…

In the article Tan states, “I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, my mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say that is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect” (pg 2). Tan explains, because her mother wasn't introduced to the secondary discourse, she wasn't given the opportunity to extend her knowledge in literacy, so with that, Tan was ashamed that her mother had “broken” English, while Tan herself was already on the road to be more successful in literacy than her mother ever was. Tan was the lucky one between her mother and herself because she was given the opportunity to learn from her mother's mistakes and take in the secondary discourse that were available for her. Tan paints an image in the reader’s mind about her experiences with having to cope with her mother being unable to communicate professionally with higher authorities, and how she found that embarrassing. Tan found that embarrassing because she believes her mother wouldn’t be taken serious because of her vocabulary and knowledge on literacy and how it isn't advanced. Tan is afraid that without high literacy skills, one will not be taken as serious as they want to be compared

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She writes, “it suddenly seemed to me, with nominalized forms, past perfect tenses, conditional phrases – all the forms of standard English that I had learned in school and through books, the forms of English I did not use at home with my mother” (Tan 394-95). A couple of sentences later she describes how she gained consciousness of the type of English she uses normally with her mother in a public setting. Undenounced to her husband, he did not notice one bit, due to the fact that he had been used to it (Fought 395). Here, it appears that Tan is so used to speaking in a particular way that she does not recognize how she is speaking sometimes. She presumably must consciously tell herself to change the way she talks.

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She struggles occasionally from day to day tasks. Since Tan’s mother English was poor, she tends to ask Tan for help “...she used to have me call people and the phone and pretend I was she” (300). Tan’s mother would tell Tan to pretend to be her to complain, ask for more information, and even

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This quote from the narrative showed the author 's realization of the difference in the way that she speaks in different environments. Later Amy grasped that she uses the same type of English with her husband, but she comprehended that it was the language of family talk or the language she grew up with. Tan starts to tell her mother 's story about the gangster that wanted her mother family to adopt him. She states, "You should know that my mother 's expressive command of English belies how much she actually understands" (Tan 1). This part of the narrative inserts that her mother knew what she was talking about even though she spoke improper English.

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Tan was in shame and pain when she would feel that people were giving her mother a negative reaction. As Tan grew older she realized that it wasn’t a big deal that her mother’s English was not that well. She got used to it because she had been talking to her for years using “Broken English” and when her mother was around

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Who ask you?!” (132). She didn’t understand what exactly her mother was trying to do for her and her mother’s goal wasn’t shown properly. The goal her mother wanted was to be the best and that translated in her mind as being a person who is a genius; an “innate intellectual or creative power of an exceptional or exalted type, such as is attributed to those people considered greatest in any area of art, science, etc.; instinctive and extraordinary capacity for imaginative creation, original thought, invention, or discovery” (Oxford dictionary). The narrator felt as if she couldn’t do what she wanted to due to her not being able to do what her mother expected from her when given the many tests and not being successful at play the

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And when the doctor called her daughter, me, who spoke perfect English, low and behold we had assurances the CAT scan would be found”.(13). This shows that again Tan had to help her mother and that she had nothing to be ashamed of. Personally this affected her in the way that her mother could not speak English too well, but she could, so she was the talker in the family. This shows the readers that if someone is different, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t help them. The audience can take her memories, so that they can understand that some people are

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