Mother Tongue questions & answers for quizzes and worksheets - Quizizz English Mother Tongue Deleted User 87 plays 15 questions Copy & Edit Live Session Show Answers See Preview 1. I am doing an assignment about the essay "Mother Tongue," but I am having a hard time understanding the claim of the author and the target audience. Students in disagreement might point to Dove's consuming interest in reading, which seems largely uninfluenced by her family, and Cisneros's belief that her desire to write came from a "hunger" she felt, even with her family. Many of the terms, such as broken or limited, are too negative and imply her English is imperfect. At one point, Tan writes about being embarrassed about her mother. ", how did amy describe her mother's english, math and science (precise and exact answers). Spend some time evaluating the essays structure, and analyze whether it is right for Mother Tongue. Would it have been better as a novel or a poem, or is a short narrative the way to go? She had cashed out her small portfolio and it just so happened we were going to go to New York the next week, our very first trip outside California. What organizational pattern does Tan use in "Mother Tongue," and how does she control her tone? There can be one tone throughout the entire piece or many different tones. Though Mother Tongue is a very short narrative, its rich in content. While it may be difficult for some people to understand it, it is part of who she is, and it does not reflect negatively on her mother because it is "different." /Subtype /Image In the essay, Tan discusses her relationship with language, and how her mothers influence has shaped her use of English, as well as her attitude to it. So you'll have some idea of what this family talk I heard sounds like, I'11 quote what my mother said during a recent conversation which I videotaped and then transcribed. spirituals. Find examples of peopleincluding Tan herselftreating her mother. Cite the text as needed to clarify and support your response. This shows how the way English is spoken affects how one is treated. [/Pattern /DeviceRGB] During this conversation, my mother was talking about a political gangster in Shanghai who had the same last name as her family's, Du, and how the gangster in his early years wanted to be adopted by her family, which was rich by comparison. 291 terms. You should know that my mother's expressive command of English belies how much she actually understands. In "Mother Tongue," Amy Tan explains that she uses multiple "Englishes" in her daily life. 2023 eNotes.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Why? Accessed 2 May 2023. Who are the experts?Our certified Educators are real professors, teachers, and scholars who use their academic expertise to tackle your toughest questions. But they seem just as bad, as if everything is limited, including people's perceptions of the limited English speaker. Explain the meaning of Tans title and how it relates to her own identity as both a Chinese American, a daughter, and a writer. It is their "language of intimacy," even though he is a native English speaker. . I've heard other terms used, "limited English," for example. She says this because it could have impacted her in developing the English skills that were expected in school. Tan says she uses "simple English" around her mother, and while this isn't the same form that her mother speaks, it symbolizes the bond between her and her family. WhowasJohnWilkesBooth? What does the title "Mother Tongue" suggest? 2. Print. -describes how her mom influenced her writing and this is why her mom is the audience. Fortunately, there are several different literary devices you can concentrate on for your literary analysis. As her mother wasn't able to speak English fluently, she wasn't taken seriously by the staff. JFIF K K C Chinese custom. I am going to show you a few of these devices and give you some awesome tips on how to incorporate them into your analysis of Mother Tongue.. She reads the Forbes report, listens to Wall Street Week, converses daily with her stockbroker, reads all of Shirley MacLaine's books with ease--all kinds of things I can't begin to understand. Tan. Enter your email address to subscribe to this site and receive notifications of new posts by email. The nature of the talk was about my writing, my life, and my book, The Joy Luck Club. Indeed, Tan conjectures that many Asian American children are probably encouraged to pursue careers in jobs requiring maths and science rather than English for this reason. The class tests at school which reduced English proficiency to an ability to recognise a correct answer are thus contrasted with Tans resounding final words of Mother Tongue, which see her seeking to capture the passion of her mother, the nature of her thoughts, and the imagery she uses: all things which her daughter has clearly inherited a respect for, and which school tests fail to capture or observe. Amy Tan "Mother Tongue" How do you want to study today? Describe what the fighting is like and what you feel are the strengths and weaknesses of your army. It's my mother tongue. But now you have to do a literary analysis on itand suddenly its short length seems like more of a burden than a blessing. -influenced Amy's writing (four Englishes) Who is the intended audience for "Mother Tongue"? The author notes that the language her mother speaks is very different than "American English," but that it is deceiving in that her mother understands more than one might think when listening to her speak. I've heard other terms used, "limited English," for example. I've been giving more thought to the kind of English my mother speaks. Does it drag on too much? << Explain the meaning of Tans title and how it relates to her own identity as both a Chinese American, a daughter, and a writer. The same was true with word analogies, pairs of words in which you were supposed to find some sort of logical, semantic relationship -- for example, "Sunset is to nightfall as is to ." Tan mentions several different emotions when talking about her mothers English. And Tan drew on all the Englishes, plural, that she knew: the broken English her mother used, the simple English Tan used when talking to her mother, the watered-down Chinese her mother used, and her mothers internal language which conveyed her passion, intent, imagery, and the nature of her thoughts. } !1AQa"q2#BR$3br Here's what she said in part: "Du Yusong having business like fruit stand. She is just as special a person, despite what language she uses or how she uses it. Do you agree or disagree with Amy Tan's conclusions about standardized tests? How does she establish ethos by this juxtaposition? mother tongue amy tan chinese american writer amy tan, whose mom moved from her homeland china to america to make better life for her daughter, struggles with 3-2 Writing Plan 5-3 Feedback and Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery. I didn't see, I heard it. Accept any answers that address the concern of the question and are elaborated by examples or details from the literature or from life. One time Amy did this with her mother's stockbroker. Latest answer posted March 29, 2020 at 10:08:05 AM. Where "mother tongue" usually refers euphemistically to someone's first language, here it refers to Amy's mother's second language: the English that Amy is familiar with her using, literally her mother's tongue. What is Tan's strategy behind including a lengthy, direct quotation from her mother (para. A person's "mother tongue" is usually considered to be their first language, but in this story, it refers to her "mother's tongue," or the version of English that her mother speaks. Amy Tan's essay "Mother Tongue" is a wonderful tale that addresses the substance of languages and how language is not only a tool of communication, but a sociological tool of measuring individual worth. This establishes ethos as she admits that her specialty is in being a writer. She said she had spoken very good English, her best English, no mistakes. Tan wrote 'Mother Tongue' in 1990, a year after her novel The Joy Luck Club was a runaway success. Amy Tan begins her essay by offering her personal opinions on the English language. Along with her BS in marketing from Florida State University and MA in museum studies from Johns Hopkins University, she has spent the past 7 years learning how best to reach and teach people using the power of words. So mad he lie to me, losing me money. She is motivated to make this argument to explain her method as a writer and her intellectual, literary, linguistic, and personal progress in uniting her two identities and to show that these identities need not be separated. In Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue," this term is a play on words. 1. Tan refers to how much language impacts/changes our lives. Her mother's language is colorful, powerful, and direct. How does Tan feel about her mother's tongue, -her mother's "limited English" limited her perception of her mother. Tan." Get inspiration from over 500,000 example essays. /Type /ExtGState But once Tan had arrived and upon hearing her perfect English, the staff had taken the case up with more urgency. 62-67. -7 space 17 space. Tan highlights this dichotomy when she writes about giving her speech, saying the proper English words that she was using felt strange to say when her mother was in the room. In the following sentence, underline each misspelled or misused word and write the correct spelling or word above the incorrect word. In one or two paragraphs, describe the personal experience that the writer had in "Mother Tongue", and the understanding she gained through her reflection about the experience. As a writer, she used the rigid, grammatical acrolect she had learned at school; as a daughter, she used the more forceful, vivid English spoken by her mother, for which she cannot even find a name, since she dislikes calling it "broken.". But many people who hear her mother speak can only partially understand what she is saying, and some even say they can understand nothing of what she says, as if she were speaking pure Chinese to them. 1 2 . In both cases, the perception based on her mother's "limited" English gave people the idea that Amy's mother wasn't very bright, or worse, was not worth their time. Even though language is not an object you can hold, Amy Tan still uses language to symbolize different, more ambiguous concepts. The argument Tan makes is that she has become a better writer by fusing these types of language than she was when she used the acrolect alone. Illustrate your observations with examples from Tan's essay, your own experience, or others you know. My mother was in the room. And then I said in perfect English, "Yes, I'm getting rather concerned. ". Tan speculates that because Asian Americans score so much higher on math achievement tests than on English tests, they are encouraged to pursue math and science in college. Why does Tan open her essay by stating, "I am not a scholar of English or literature" but then state, in the next paragraph, "I am a writer"? What argument is Tan making here about language and its connection to our identity in "Mother Tongue"? -speech-like; "I was giving a talk to a large group of people." Latest answer posted March 29, 2020 at 1:00:09 PM. . That man want to ask Du Zong father take him in like become own family. eNotes.com will help you with any book or any question. But they seem just as bad, as if everything is limited, including people's perceptions of the limited English speaker. What are some good things Andrew Carnegie did? eNotes.com will help you with any book or any question. Then evaluate her message. How does she use language in the rest of her story to portray this rebelliousness? while growing up, what assumption did Amy Tan make about her mother because of her mother's language skills? Tan notes the difficulty of finding a term to describe the style of English her mother, as a Chinese immigrant to the United States, speaks. All together, we expect forty or fifty volunteers to work on the project. How do these resemble chapters? << Chapter 8 and Symbolism in The Great Gatsby, The Language of Composition: Reading, Writing, Rhetoric, Lawrence Scanlon, Renee H. Shea, Robin Dissin Aufses, Edge Reading, Writing and Language: Level C, David W. Moore, Deborah Short, Michael W. Smith. She mentions the figure that most Asian students in schools are not enrolled in artistic courses, such as creative writing. In a short essay "Mother Tongue," Amy Tan reveals her background and describes different kinds of English that she had to speak in her childhood and adolescence. What assumptions are people making about Tan's mother in these situations and why? think my mother's English almost had an effect on limiting my possibilities in life as well. She recalls a recent talk she gave, when, upon realising her mother was in the audience, she was confronted with the fact that the formal standard English she was using in the public talk was at odds with the way she spoke at home with her mother. 1. What strategies does she use to make this How did Tans teachers identify her when she was in high school? He is Du like Du Zong -- but not Tsung-ming Island people. Tan does illustrate each category she identifies 4. She acknowledges that when she was growing up, she was ashamed of the way her mother spoke. How did railroads help boost industrialization? Works have been adapted for film, opera, and TV mother tongue first language Whom does the author focus on in this narrative? Tan says that her identity as a writer was originally separate from her identity as her mother's daughter. In fact, Tan uses the same tone in the beginning and end of her storythe reader starts at a homebase, sees the journey Tan is leading them on, and returns right back to where they started but with more insight than before. As for accents, it's usually a stereotype of some sort. Students' writing should address the specific experiences and messages of the essays that they choose. On what were these descriptions and perceptions based according to paragraphs 15-16 of "Mother Tongue"? How do each of these shifts in tone help move the reader along in the story? This was understandable. But to me, my mother's English is perfectly clear, perfectly natural. Tan does a great job incorporating several different tones into such a short piece. What organizational pattern does Tan use in "Mother Tongue," and how does she control her tone? 8. At several points in her essay, Tan related anecdotes. Mother Tongue by Amy Tan questions & answers for quizzes and worksheets - Quizizz Find and create gamified quizzes, lessons, presentations, and flashcards for students, employees, and everyone else. Then write an essay in which you explain the use of English in your life and communications. Tan, Amy. This is not to say that people of other countries do not learn English as well, but generally there is a language specific to the place where they were born: this is their mother tongue. Chinese age I was nineteen. She alludes to several instances where people, even a doctor, would not take her mother seriously because of the way she spoke. In paragraph 6, Tan quotes part of one of her mother's conversations.

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