Hijas De China

"I wanted my children to have the best combination: American circumstances and Chinese character. How could I know these two things do not mix?"(Tan 289). In The Joy Luck Club , a book by Amy Tan,eight woman, four mothers and four daughters, have a lot of problems they have to confront. Some problems that they have to confront include: lifestyle, language and cultural barriers.
Some mothersand daughters are separated by their lifestyle. For American-Chinese, financial affluence is more important than cultural issues. For example, they focus more on cars, stocks, bonds, and home ownership.All this is seen as a second priority to Chinese citizens, their mothers. Another difference of lifestyle between Chinese-American mothers and their American-Chinese daughters is their clothing.Chinese-Americans wear their chinese clothing regularly, while their American-Chinese daughters tend to only wear them for special occasions. But other than the lifestyle differences, American-Chinese"are Americans in all but physical appearance"(Lee 119).
The mothers, to the daughters unknowingly, use both languages, not because they are ignorant of American culture, but because they want tosustain both cultures, Chinese and American. It is "unlikely that mothers and daughters can achieve a perfect identification: the burden of differences in personal history and cultural conditioning is fartoo great"(Heung 603). The mothers use Chinese and often broken language to talk to the American-Chinese daughters. For example, these woman are socially segregated, with language being a barrier, theChinese-American mothers can rely on their stories and past memories of their culture to connect them to their daughters together.
The mothers in The Joy Luck Club are anxious over losing theirdaughters because of cultural barriers that is placed between them. "All mothers want for their daughters is to have the best of both cultures 'without losing their ancient souls'"(Mistri 253). In this...