Joy Luck Club Identity
Identity Crisis
Every person comes to a point in their life when they begin to search for themselves and their identity. Usually it is a long process and takes a long time with many wrong turns along the way. Family, teachers, and friends all help to develop a person into an individual and adult. Parents play the largest role in evolving a person. Amy Tan, author of the Joy Luck Club, uses this theme in her book. Four mothers have migrated to America from China because of their own struggles. They all want their daughters to grow up successful and without any of the hardships they went through. One mother, Suyuan, imparts her knowledge on her daughter through stories. The American culture influences her daughter, Jing Mei, to such …show more content…
Suyuan had to make the hard decision to leave her twin babies on the side of the road in hopes some kind stranger would take them in, that way she would not have to see them die. Suyuan searches for her babies all through her life in America, sending multitudes of letters; they finally get in touch with her two months after she has died. Because her mother is not alive to meet her children, Jing Mei takes her place and the trip enables her to finally recognize her Chinese ancestry. The minute she enters China she "feels different" and can realize that she is "becoming Chinese" (306). At fifteen Jing Mei believed she was only as Chinese as her "Caucasian friends" (306). Yet her mother counters thoughts, telling her: "Once you are born Chinese, you cannot help but feel and think Chinese" (306). Once in China Jing Mei decides her mother was right and she "has never really known what it meant to be Chinese" (307). She has never understood her mother or her heritage. This trip is the connecting link to understanding her life. She begins to feel natural in China, thinking to herself on the train: "I am in China It feels right" (312). Jing Mei sees the landscape, the people, the histories, and the families in China and sees where her mother was speaking from all of those years. She knows a "little percent" of her mother know (15). It becomes "obvious" to Jing Mei to see what "part of [her] is Chinese"; it is "in her family, in her blood"
Every person comes to a point in their life when they begin to search for themselves and their identity. Usually it is a long process and takes a long time with many wrong turns along the way. Family, teachers, and friends all help to develop a person into an individual and adult. Parents play the largest role in evolving a person. Amy Tan, author of the Joy Luck Club, uses this theme in her book. Four mothers have migrated to America from China because of their own struggles. They all want their daughters to grow up successful and without any of the hardships they went through. One mother, Suyuan, imparts her knowledge on her daughter through stories. The American culture influences her daughter, Jing Mei, to such …show more content…
Suyuan had to make the hard decision to leave her twin babies on the side of the road in hopes some kind stranger would take them in, that way she would not have to see them die. Suyuan searches for her babies all through her life in America, sending multitudes of letters; they finally get in touch with her two months after she has died. Because her mother is not alive to meet her children, Jing Mei takes her place and the trip enables her to finally recognize her Chinese ancestry. The minute she enters China she "feels different" and can realize that she is "becoming Chinese" (306). At fifteen Jing Mei believed she was only as Chinese as her "Caucasian friends" (306). Yet her mother counters thoughts, telling her: "Once you are born Chinese, you cannot help but feel and think Chinese" (306). Once in China Jing Mei decides her mother was right and she "has never really known what it meant to be Chinese" (307). She has never understood her mother or her heritage. This trip is the connecting link to understanding her life. She begins to feel natural in China, thinking to herself on the train: "I am in China It feels right" (312). Jing Mei sees the landscape, the people, the histories, and the families in China and sees where her mother was speaking from all of those years. She knows a "little percent" of her mother know (15). It becomes "obvious" to Jing Mei to see what "part of [her] is Chinese"; it is "in her family, in her blood"