Gender Roles In Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club

Throughout the novel, “Joy Luck Club” by there is a cultural misunderstanding language between the mothers and daughters identities in the novel. It is hard for the daughters to reconcile their Chinese heritage with their American surroundings. Most of the daughters spent their childhood trying to escape their Chinese identities, and their mothers tried helping them find them. The mothers give direction to their daughter’s lives to find their identity. Even though the daughters are confused on their own identities their mothers do not question them. As the daughters matured they found their identities in their Chinese culture. The novel explains the sensitive and stubborn bond in 16 stories that explain the mothers and daughters different experiences of finding hope.
The mothers in “The Joy Luck Club” have an expectation of their daughters to obey them. They expect their daughters to learn from them and do as they did in China. These mothers retained much of their Chinese identities and language, unlike their Americanized daughter and are rejecting their Chinese identities. The mothers can avoid their daughter’s behaviors because they expect them to behave properly. The mothers assume that knowledge is natural and is in their daughters. "Only two kind of daughters. Those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind! Only one kind of daughter can live in this house. Obedient daughter!"(Tan 142). The daughters resist and misinterpret their mother’s Chinese ways and beliefs as a child. It was hard for the daughters to communicate with their mothers. The daughters grew impatient of their mothers who spoke in fractured