Preview

Jing Mei In Two Kinds

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
764 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Jing Mei In Two Kinds
Two Kinds is a story about a Mother’s relationship with her daughter. Jing Mei’s mother came to The United States in 1949 from China and resided in San Francisco, California. Her time living China, she had lost all hope when she had lost her entire family. She had remarried with her second husband and had Jing Mei. When she moved to the United States she was in the hopes of pursuing her dreams in her daughter. She imposed upon her daughter Jing Mei her high expectations for her. “At first my mother thought I could be a Chinese Shirley Temple.” (Tan 1), and it all began from then on. Taking her to the beauty salon and dressing her up as this perfect little girl, from piano lessons to having perfect grades in school, and becoming a prodigy. “In …show more content…
Jing Mei is tired of how her mother treats her and how she is trying to turn her into something that she’s not. She uses her stubbornness to take advantage of her piano instructor when she had learned why he had retired. Half the time she did not play and abused her piano lessons. At the contest Jing Mei’s performance was horrible. Her Maturity was when she had regretted saying the words she had said to her mother as a child “"Then I wish I weren't your daughter, I wish you weren't my mother," I shouted. As I said these things I got scared. It felt like worms and toads and slimy things crawling out of my chest, but it also felt good, that this awful side of me had surfaced, at last.” (Tan 5), “Then I wish I'd never been born!" I shouted. “I wish I were dead! Like them.” (Tan …show more content…
Amy uses symbolism to show the struggles between mothers and daughters. Jing Mei’s mother believed that living in America you can do anything you put your heart into and succeed. After losing her entire life in China she puts these expectations in her daughter. “My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America. You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get good retirement. You could buy a house with almost no money down. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous. "Of course, you can be a prodigy, too," my mother told me when I was nine. "You can be best anything.” (Tan

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Though the two stories “Fish cheeks” and “Two Kinds” have many similarities, their differences play a key role in defining each individual story. Both stories have the same basic setup; they are each told from the point of view of a young Asian-American girl, who are both the daughters of generation Chinese immigrants. This proves to be a source of conflict in the two stories, due to the fact that the cultural and generational differences between both mother-daughter duos. In the story “Fish Cheeks,” the narrator is struggling with her heritage and cultural traditions as she tries to fit into American society and be accepted by her peers, specifically, the minister’s son. She is embarrassed by her mother’s ethnic food choices for dinner and…

    • 353 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story Two Kinds is about a Chinese girl, Jing-Mei, who lives life trying to find herself under her over-bearing mother’s envisions and high expectations of what she feels Jing-Mei should become. The subject of the mother-daughter dynamic and lack of obedience is revealed from the beginning of the story; as well as the fact their relationship is rather conflicted. Throughout the story Jing-Mei is very obstructive to the ideas her mom puts forth. Her constant acts of disobeying and rebelling against her mom orders, express how the tension arose between Jing-Mei and her mom. The fact her mom had an extremely difficult life in China until she lost everything and moved to America, explains and sort of justifies why she was so obsessed with Jing-Mei excelling and making something of her, life in addition to her desire of wanting to be able to brag. Unfortunately, rather than allowing Jing-Mei to find something she was comfortable with and make an independent decision of what she wanted in her life, she forced activities and ideas on her which eventually resulted in Jing-Mei becoming rebellious. As Jing-Mei became rebellious, her mom implemented her…

    • 918 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    <br>At the talent show, Jing-Mei's practicing habits show, and she truly learns what her mother wants. She was supposed to play "Pleading Child." In getting ready for the show, Jing-Mei would cheat and never really listen to what she was playing. When it came to the recital, Jing-Mei was so confident that she could pull it off that she started hitting wrong notes and realizing it. She had felt her mother's shame. As a result of the talent show massacre, Jing-Mei didn't want to play the piano anymore. Then, when her mother wants her to practice, she decides that she defiantly won't.…

    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    As a devoted mother she wanted her children to be accustomed to the American culture and to excel at American things but she did not want them to forget their Chinese heritageWaverly, Lindo’s only daughter doesn’t really respect or listen to her. Lindo even begins to believe Waverly is ashamed of her. But Lindo was always exceptionally proud of Waverly, especially proud of her plethora of chess awards. She always encouraged Waverly to be the best she could be. Lindo and Suyuan constantly try to outdo each other using their daughters. It makes Waverly and Suyuan’s daughter Ani-Mei not get along very well because Waverly always seems better than Jing-Mei. Lindo despises that Waverly had become…

    • 445 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jing-Mei’s mother then encouraged Jing-Mei to play piano and perform in a talent show. When Jing-Mei’s turn came, she was confident and thought “without a doubt, that the prodigy inside of [her] really did exist” (pg 7). However, as she started playing “[she] was surprised when [she] hit the first wrong note. And then hit another and another” (pg 7). In the end, Jing-Mei’s performance was nothing like she expected she “felt the shame of [her] mother and father as they sat stiffly through the rest of the show” (pg 7). After the talent show, Jing-Mei’s was devastated and decided she was never going to play piano anymore; she could never be the prodigy or daughter her mother wants her to…

    • 692 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    But they fought over her playing the piano. Jing-nei said mean things to her that hurt her. Her mother said there were “only two kinds of daughters the ones that are obedient, and those who followed their own mind”. She told her only obedient daughter live in this house. She told her mother she wished she was not her daughter. Her mother was very angary seeing this she told her mother she wished she was dead like them. Hearing this her mother was hurt and left the room. After this she never played the piano again. They never talked about the recital or her terrible accusation afterwards at the piano bench. She never found away to ask her why she had hoped for something so large that failure was inevitable (Kirszner, Mandell,…

    • 1173 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The short story “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, starts off with introducing the mother interpretation of how she want her daughter to live the American Dream. The mothers loses her family in China and now hopes to relive that part of her loss through her daughter. However, the daughter, Ni Kan, is not interested in her mother’s dreams and totally ignores against them. In the beginning, Ni Kan, says that she is “just as excited as her mother maybe even more so” about her becoming a prodigy. She pictures herself in different roles such as a ballerina and believes that once that she has become perfected…

    • 490 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Tan uses the central conflict of Jing-Mei wanting to be one kind of daughter, while her mother wants her to be another kind of daughter. Which leads to the title, ?Two Kinds.? Most of the excerpt is a continuous conflict between the daughter and mother arguing about who she was going to be in life. Especially since they are from China and had a hard life there, her mother sees being in America as an opportunity for her daughter to do anything and even become a prodigy. In chunk 1 it mentions, ?My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America.? All throughout the excerpt the mother tries to get her daughter to be a ?genius? and become a prodigy but, Jing-Mei refuses to be someone she isn?t and decides to follow her own mind.…

    • 227 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In this story also the writer's mother wanted her daughter to be obedient by following her path. As she was optimistic, she always wants her daughter to be successful in the future thus forced her daughter to have the prodigy that she never wanted to be. She has a high expectation towards her daughter but every time she fails to stand to the expectation. The narrator also feels as if she could not handle her responsibility and let her mother's expectation down. From the Chinese Shirley Temple to the piano lesson the narrator mother's always responses saying not the best because you are not trying. Everymen the writer had the disappointment on herself for not performing well. From the other points of view, the mother has a genuine love towards her daughter. In conclusion, the story has revealed the mother-daughter relationship and also the generational gap between…

    • 1233 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The mother of Jing-mei had high hopes for her daughter in Amy Tan’s essay “Two Kinds” to become a prodigy when coming here in America. Tan states, “My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America” (pg.18, paragraph 1) that since they’re in America her mother aims for Jing-mei to be a successful prodigy. Her mother had lost everything back in China and starts a new life in San Francisco with Jing-mei and make her an actress in the beginning. Tan also states, “.. I was excited as my mother, maybe even more so.” (pg.19, paragraph 8) this conveys that Jing-mei was also very hopeful in the beginning of her mother’s idea of becoming a prodigy. Later in this essay, Her mother had ventured talents for Jing-mei to become a girl…

    • 319 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    The Joy Luck Club Essay

    • 9527 Words
    • 39 Pages

    Jing-mei always had a troubled relationship with her mother, so when Suyuan dies, she has to deal with her grief, frustration, and her many questions. She never understood why her mother was never satisfied with her. She never knew the whole story of hermother 's previous life in China. She does not speak Chinese fluently, and she tried to reject Chinese culture and even, for a while, believed that she was not Chinese at all. After her mother 'sdeath, she begins to see that her mother 's history is part of her, and China is part of her identity. When she finally meets hermother 's other daughters in China, she feels like she has her mother back. She also begins to see that though they often fought and rarely saw eye to eye, her mother did love her and understood her, at times, even better than she understood…

    • 9527 Words
    • 39 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Joy Luck Club Symbols

    • 356 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Jing-mei (June) Woo, the character, is a symbol herself of Westernization of Chinese-Americans. Once she travels to China to visit her deceased mother, she realizes what Chinese culture is all about and what she has been culturally unaware of all this time. Jing-mei and the other daughters always identified themselves as Americans, but often doubted whether or not they should be speaking the Chinese language to keep their cultural identity alive within themselves. Additionally, Jing-mei is representative of Chinese and American comparisons in culture. The mothers in this novel maintained high expectations of their daughters, emphasizing filial obedience and giving constructive criticism all the time. These experiences clashed with American virtues of free speech and free will. After her visit to China, Jing-mei resolves the missing cultural values of herself and the Joy Luck Club and…

    • 356 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The Average Comparison

    • 1095 Words
    • 5 Pages

    In Two Kinds the protagonist’s mother comes from China and “[believes] you [can] be anything…

    • 1095 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Joy Luck Club Identity

    • 1016 Words
    • 5 Pages

    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"…

    • 1016 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    I believed that Jing-Mei’s mother’s friends at the club referred her as a rabbit because they weren’t expecting her dying. This is related to a rabbit because you would never know when the rabbit is going to die. I also feel like that her mother died like a rabbit because when a rabbit is dying, they die right away like how her mother probably didn’t have time to get better. Her mother died young because she still had business to do. If she was older, she would have a lot of free time. Since Jing-Mei’s mother was in charge of Joy Luck Club, I felt like that was one of the business that she had to cover. Now that she is gone, there isn’t anyone there to replace her.…

    • 287 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays