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The Joy Luck Club Identity Essay

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Second-generation immigrant struggle to develop this identity because the temptations of assimilation overpower the need to preserve cultural heritage. They credit the formation of their individuality to their western culture, when in fact, it is through their parents they gain a sense of self. This is portrayed in Amy Tan’s, The Joy Luck Club, a multi-perspective novel that encompasses the use of storytelling to demonstrate the relationships between four immigrant mothers and their American-born daughters. Through Jing-Mei’s perceptive character, the conflict she experiences with her mother’s ideals, and the use of simile and symbolism, Tan suggests that maternal love guides an individual to finding their identity.
Jing-Mei is an individual prone to dismiss her oriental heritage to gain acceptance from the surrounding western culture. However, her perceptive nature enables her to realize the ethnic identity maternal love can evoke. June’s trip to meet her half-sisters in China is essentially guided by her mother’s dying wish, but soon becomes a discovery of her bicultural self. When June hugs her half-sisters, she …show more content…

These stories are vital to the characters’ development for they “cultivate both positive mother-daughter relationships and individual identities of strength because the foundational stories allow the women ‘glimmers of understanding’ about themselves and their relationships within a larger social context” (Wood, 85). Through storytelling, mothers are able to pass down life lessons encompassed in the painful events of their past that demonstrate strength and endurance amidst turmoil. Rather then direct advice or warnings that can be easily forgotten, these stories aim to build emotional connections that motivate daughters to learn from the mistakes of their mothers and take the initiative to reconstruct their

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In Amy Tan’s novel, The Joy Luck Club, many cultural differences exist between the characters, creating complications in their relationships. An example of a cultural difference is between An-mei’s Chinese values and traditions and those of Christianity. The collision of these Chinese and Christian faiths profoundly influences An-Mei's character by causing her to doubt both faiths and resulting in her daughter Rose's inability to control her own choices. An-mei’s exposure to Chinese culture and the Christian faith results in an intermixing of both ideals which eventually leads to a cultural collision. An-mei is exposed to the traditional Chinese values of filial piety, wisdom, deference, and honesty through her grandmother.

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For instance, her famous novel ‘The Joy Luck Club’ depicts the Chinese mother and her American daughter relationship where they go through various circumstances trying to understand each other including the evolvement that comes in their relationships as the daughters know more about their mother’s life stories. Secondly, Tan considers the theme of identity in terms of Chinese immigrants and their life experiences as an immigrant in the United States. She reveals how the children born to the immigrants strive in an environment which is a mixture of American and Chinese influence. Moreover, Tan is found to have explored identity issues through her fictive creations and tackled the issue of authorial identity (Becnel, 2010). Similarly, romantic love is another subject included in the literary artworks of Amy Tan which considers the relationships and romance an important aspect of human’s life.

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Throughout the novel The Joy Luck Club, Jing-Mei Woo struggles with her sense of identity and belonging in a community as she is often embarrassed of her heritage, and prefers to live her life in the shadows. However, at the end of the book, Jin-mei finds peace when she seeks her roots and sisters in China. She finally finds her inner Chinese that she described is “in your blood waiting to be let go” (Tan 306). This shows that although immigrants of the time period often struggled with self identity, deep down they wanted to find acceptance in their

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Crossing Of The Cultural Divide In the novel, The Joy Luck Club, written by Amy Tan, follows a storyline that explores the relationships between four Chinese-American mothers and their four Chinese-American daughters, navigating the cultural divide between their ancestral roots and their American upbringing. The poem, “Mother’s Day” by Daisy Zamora, describes the struggles and sacrifices of mothers, particularly those living in poverty, as they strive to provide for their children, and maintain hope in the place of hardship. Both The Joy Luck Club and “Mother's Day” use characterization, tone, and diction to illustrate the theme that the insist on cultural identity of instilling cultural values onto their children, can often result in the rejection

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People have different perspectives on what makes a good or bad parent. Some people think that being a good parent means someone who truly cares for their child while others think that a good parent is someone who fills the needs of their child. The "Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan documents the narratives of four pairs of Chinese American mothers and daughters. The parents in this novel are good parents for a number of reasons. One reason why the parents in this novel are good is because they try to build respnsibility in their child.

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As seen by the mothers’ and daughters’ behavior towards each other in The Joy Luck Club, it is difficult to preserve one’s culture when one is exposed to a new environment or country. With a difference of two distinct generations between them, the four main pairs often come across cultural collisions. Other than facing the age gap, these mothers and daughters also have to deal with a language and communication barrier. Already, at the beginning of the story, Jing-Mei Woo is able to understand how the mothers of the “Joy Luck Club” are displeased with their daughter’s rejection of their Chinese culture. She speaks to herself, admitting that “they are frightened.

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In her novel, The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan focuses on the fact that the bond between a mother and daughter can overcome any ethnic barrier. Despite there being many disagreements and arguments about the ways to live their lives, Tan defies this issue by creating a bond that is unbreakable even though the experienced different upbringings. Certain disagreements keep the novel interesting and create a conflict depicting the problems stemming from this barrier. Through her use of similes, metaphors, and flashbacks, Tan shows how the bond between a mother and daughter can withstand even the strongest cultural differences.

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Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club is an amazing representation of what Chinese immigrants and their families face. The broad spectrum of the mothers’ and daughters’ stories all connect back to a couple of constantly recurring patterns. These patterns are used to show that how the mothers and daughters were so differently raised affected their relationships with each other, for better and for worse. To begin with, the ever-present pattern of disconnect between the two groups of women is used to show how drastically differently they were raised.

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This sense of careful design enhances Tan’s portrayal of traditional china with its rigidly structured hierarchies and social structures, its codified rituals, and its established protocols governing the lives of its people. By contrast, the American settings pulse with life, energy, and chaos. Whereas in China, the Joy Luck mothers had centuries of established convention dictating their behavior and America’s cultural practices are strange and unfathomable and these women who have left china specifically for the chance to start afresh in a new country far from the stultifying tradition of the old, find themselves reverting to the familiar customs of their faraway homeland. Barred for a variety of reasons from achieving the dreams of success that brought them to America, the mothers transfer their ambitions to their daughters in whom they hope to combine the best of Chinese and American culture. On those daughters, who grow up in Chinatown but attend American schools, rest the hopes of their immigrant

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In her debut novel, author Amy Tan explains how unimportance and overall loss of heritage amid immigrant families affect them. Much later, in 2015, Quetzal Marucci photographs and interviews second-generation immigrants on their experiences and struggles with their cultural identities. In the novel, each mother wishes to instill traditional values in her daughter before she becomes too americanized, however, one daughter’s caucasian friends claim that she was just “about as Chinese as they were” (Tan 267). Likewise, a Russian-American interviewee, Sasha Kazachkova, explained that she feels closer to her American friends than her Russian immigrant ones due to differences in valuing Russian culture. In her visit to China, Jing-mei feels that

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“Communication is the key to a successful relationship, attentiveness, and consistency. Without it, there is no relationship,” (Bleau). The Joy Luck Club is a novel written by Amy Tan. Set in the twentieth century, this novel depicts the life of four Chinese immigrant women escaping their past and their American-grown daughters. The novel reveals the mothers’ hardship-filled past and motivations alongside with the daughters’ inner conflicts and struggles.

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Everyone sees the world through their eyes differently depending on the influences they have had in their life, especially with their culture. In Amy Tan’s novel the Joy Luck Club the protagonist Jing-Mei ( June) Woo as well as the other characters in the novel experience life in an on-going struggle with their culture identity. The author Amy Tan presents how the main character views others and the world using symbolism, flashbacks, and point of view. Symbolism within storytelling and objects were used to spread the idea of culture.

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