Theme Of The Jade Peony

The experiences of Asian immigrants living in Canada are unique and individual. Wayson Choi’s The Jade Peony and CBC’s Kim’s Convenience are both stories of Asian immigrant families and their dynamics and experiences. Like the Jade Peony, the story of Kim’s convenience is told from the perspectives of the children of the Kim family. A significant theme of both stories is Tradition vs. Modernity. This can be seen with Poh Poh and Appa and Umma’s relationship with tradition, and their different interactions with it as first generation immigrants. Another example is Liang and Janet, and their shared love of pop culture. These comparisons raise questions about the correlation between immigration and whether it or not it upholds and encourages

In The Jade Peony, Poh Poh is the children’s grandmother. She is known for being extremely traditional, wise, and often quite kooky. She takes great strides to ensure that her son and grandchildren continue to uphold traditional Chinese values. On the other hand Umma and Appa are caught between the traditional values they grew up with, and the modern world that they now live in. Both parents strive to merge their traditional values with the new opportunities in their modern world. Umma participates in many Korean social groups, and really enjoys cooking and sharing Korean food. She also makes efforts to learn about the western things that her children are into. “You don't like his beard? This is a miracle. Most Korean men, they cannot grow beard. But this land is fertile.”(Umma, Kim’s Convenience, S1E5) In this quote, Umma is defending her husband’s beard to

In The Jade Peony, Liang is fascinated with pop culture, specifically Shirley Temple. Not unlike how Liang wishes to be a performer, Janet is a photographer and is very interested in the arts. She even attended The Ontario College of Art and Design. Both girls also have a parental figure that is critical or skeptical of their dreams. At the beginning of Kim’s Convenience, We are introduced to Janet’s photography, and Appa’s distaste for it. In the episode “Janet’s Photos,” Appa tells his wife and daughter that art school is a “scam” because people want to see beautiful things, and Janet’s highly successful photography assignment contained images of mundane things such as some old boots and a telephone pole. (S1E2) He then tells her to “take out the trash, not photos of it.” Towards the end of the episode, Appa comes to his senses and apologizes to Janet. He gives her a tripod that he paid for using the money he made selling her photos. Janet faced some skepticism, but eventually got her dad’s support. As previously stated, Umma and Appa are open to learning about and participating in western culture. This is one of the cases where we see a little more humanity in Poh Poh. In the second chapter of The Jade Peony, Liang decides that she would like to tap dance for Wong Suk. Poh Poh helps Liang decorate the second hand shoes that were purchased with ornate ribbons. Liang