The Joy Luck Club Cultural Analysis

As discussed in the previous chapter, cultural and language barrier have caused serious obstacles for the mothers and daughters. Not being able to see and think from each other’s perspective blocks the path to effective communication which result in silence between them. The focus of this chapter is to analysis in details of Jing-mei’s change after her mother’s death and her trip to China to meet her lost sisters, which symbolizes that her split identity is healed and her relationship with her mother is reconciled as well. The mother-daughter relationships between the other mothers and daughters in The Joy Luck Club will also be studied When Jing-mei is young, she is the same as the other three daughters - an outsider of their mothers’ world. She laughs at her mother’s “fractured English” and she “[grows] impatient” when her mother speaks Chinese (40).

The most prominent example of shame and guilt occurs between the mothers and daughters. There daughters were always ashamed of and resented their mothers, especially while they were young. The daughters felt this way because of the way their mothers raised them. The mothers were very hard on their daughters, and pushed them towards successful, sometimes causing their daughter to feel overwhelmed. The mothers wanted their daughters to keep their Chinese heritage and culture, but also take advantage of the opportunities they have in America.

This is one of her fears, not to be accepted by the American society, because that means she will never leave behind her parents` tradition, a tradition that she does not respect or desire for her. Second of all, she is in disagreement with her Chinese upbringing. She feels as if she does not belong there, that she is the black ship of the family: ``I thought every house had to have its crazy woman or crazy girl, every village its idiot. Who would be it at our house? Probably me.

Throughout the novel, Jing Mei explains her rocky relationship and lack of affection with her high demanding Chinese mother. She was ashamed and embarrassed of her heritage, and the "funny Chinese dresses with stiff stand-up collars and blooming branches of embroidered silk sewn over their breasts." She believed that the Joy Luck Club was a "shameful Chinese custom, like the secret gathering of the Ku Klux Klan or the tom-tom dances of TV Indians preparing for war." In addition, she constantly compared herself to Waverly, without recognizing her own talent. June’s lack of belief in herself led to her feeling alienated from the Chinese mothers and daughter in the Joy Luck Club.

Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club explores the conflicts between two generations and two different cultures. Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club is a novel that touches upon the relationships and conflicts of Chinese mothers and their American raised daughters. As my essay will prove the split from one generation and the other relates to the process of Americanization that the daughters undergo, as well as the values and Chinese heritage that the mothers refuse to let go off. These factors will cause mutual suffering and in the end a generational gap between the two groups. The resulting generational gap animates the narrative, as mothers and daughters seek to appreciate each other, and their individual efforts diminish and contain the traumas depicted as precise of the maternal, Chinese culture.

Clarisse asks “Are you happy?” (10) Clarisse is a complete opposite compared to Mildred's unsocial and dark representations. Clarisse represents a side of people that the government does not want people to be like or to see. In the dystopian society they are living in, seeing a girl like Clarisse is rare and the government sees her and her family to be a threat. Her family are often reported to be heard laughing and talking which to there society, is considered a disturbance to the government. Clarisse does everything she can do to keep herself from being wrapped up in the dystopian society she is forced into, unlike Mildred who is what the government sees to be a model citizen.

In the story, Yeh-Shen, by Ai-Ling Louie which takes place in southern China, the reader learns what comes around goes around. For example, Yeh-Shen had no respect from her stepmother and stepsister, so at the end the prince love Yeh-Shen but is not allowing them to visit. “Not long after this, she, married the king. Because of the stepmother and stepsister treatment of Yeh-Shen, the king forbid them to come too he palace.” (pg. 3) The stepmother and stepsister most likely never thought of Yeh-Shen ever marrying the prince.

In the novel LuLing Liu Young the mother of Ruth was going through a phase that her ability to remember things was decreasing which has a huge effect on a person’s daily functions. Mother daughter relationship can be complex and how miscommunication can damage it. While Ruth was keeping her secrets to herself about how she feel about her mother made it worse to build the relationship. “Ruth was tumbling in her head. She was being swept and tossed, and she was scared.” (310).

Johnson refuses to give the quilts to Wangero, one wonders if it was because she hated her daughter over the rejection of the family heritage, because she had found success, or if her daughter was an unlikeable character from the start. Was there a jealousy that her older daughter had found success and confidence when she would never know any, was she jealous of the confidence her daughter displayed by saying she did not have to live under the old ways anymore, or was she favoring Maggie over Wangero, since Maggie was flawed like herself? No matter whether one sides with Mrs. Johnson and Maggie on the value of the quilts, or with Wangero, the obvious schism is clear. Where one party values them because of the family connection, the other rejects that connection because it was born out of oppression and

The most noteworthy conflicts were balancing motherhood and her role as a political figure. For example, during her tenure as an activist, strangers and colleagues benefited from her affection, time and devotion. Whereas, her children did not and this ultimately negatively impacted her children's lives in their failed social relationships. Another role conflict that she experienced was her role as daughter-in-law and mother. Often, in public opinion Eleanor was branded as a bad mother, which was an unfair observation from outsiders which weren't privy to her authority being emasculated on a daily basis by her mother-in-law.