Summery and Response: Mother Tongue

              Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” was about how her mother couldn’t speak English fluently by an average American’s standards even though Amy could understand the exact meaning behind her mother’s words. She talked a lot about her childhood and how her mother would not be properly treated because of her “broken” English and how Amy would usually be the one on the phone talking with doctors pretending to be her own mother. She even goes to say that she was actually embarrassed and ashamed about her mother’s English. In the end though, Amy describes how she loves the way her mother speaks and how much she was inspired by her to write books that everyone could understand. One quote I was really drawn to was one about her mother on page 117 that really reminded me of my own mother, “I wanted to capture what language ability tests can never reveal: her intent, her passion, her imagery, the rhythms of her speech and the nature of her thoughts.”

                This passage really hit home for me because of my own mother and my experiences during my childhood. My mother was the only one out of her 6 sisters and 2 brothers to learn English and worked hard every day to master it. She even went to night classes where she actually met my father, who was her teacher at the time.  She moved to America with him and struggled with the language. She couldn’t seem to understand all the exceptions to the rules and the way the words looked didn’t match how they sounded. Nevertheless, she worked hard every day to try to blend her own “broken” English into a natural American born’s English.  I too find myself speaking differently to her than I would my peers so I felt a connection to Amy Tan in this piece. I have to say that I agree with her in the end because it’s the meaning behind the words that count, not the “broken” English.