ipl-logo

Painful Experiences In Amy Tan's Fish Cheeks

407 Words2 Pages

Growing up to be a decent human being is not easy. Experiences that are teachable moments can be comfortable or may be hurtful. People construe harmless events into catastrophic disasters. Amy Tan, Chinese American author, interprets her Christmas celebration to be an unpleasant event. In “Fish Cheeks,” Amy Tan uses diction and details to reveal her embarrassment of being Chinese. Tan’s diction sheds light on the humiliation of her heritage. Using the word “shabby” to describe her Christmas indicates her disappointment (paragraph 2). This atypical choice of words does not fit a holiday that most consider great. Tan, consumed by her feelings of insecurity about being different, creates in the reader the assumption that she is an ungrateful

Show More
Related

  • Symbolism In Amy Tan's 'Shabby Chinese Dinner'

    57 Words  | 1 Pages

    Before the narrator’s crush arrives for dinner she contemplates, “What would Robert think of our shabby Chinese Christmas?”   Her questioning shows her fear of embarrassment in the about the upcoming dinner. Tan’s use of the word “shabby” focuses on the narrator’s feelings that her traditional Chinese dinner is not as good as the traditional American Christmas

    Read More

  • The Hotel On The Corner Of Bitter And Sweet Quotes

    575 Words  | 3 Pages

    "The Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet" by Jamie Ford is a captivating coming-of-age story that follows the life of Henry Lee, a Chinese-American boy growing up in Seattle during World War II. Throughout the novel, Henry experiences profound personal growth and self-discovery as he navigates the complexities of racial tensions, family expectations, and first love. This essay will explore how four quotes from the book exemplify the transformative journey of Henry's coming of age. Paragraph 1: In the early stages of the novel, a young Henry grapples with his dual identity as an American-born Chinese.

    Read More

  • Summary Of Fish Cheeks By Amy A Dynamic Character

    214 Words  | 1 Pages

    Amy in the autobiography “Fish Cheeks” is a dynamic character. This can be inferred because of evidence in the text. For example, in the beginning of the story she is nervous and worried about Robert and his family coming over for Christmas dinner. In addition to being nervous and worried, Amy is mortified that her relatives lack American manners. As a result, Amy becomes proud of her heritage and embraces her Chinese culture.

    Read More

  • Mexicans Begin Jogg Analysis

    505 Words  | 3 Pages

    The author Amy Tan, in her text she deals with living in the American society more than the other author because she gives the reader a clear idea of what she is going through at the moment. In the story “Fish Cheeks” by Amy Tan, it says “What would Robert think of our shabby Chinese Christmas? What would he think of our noisy Chinese relatives who lacked poor proper American manners?” Tan

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis On Mother Tongue

    877 Words  | 4 Pages

    Reflecting on them, she expresses the meaning her mother's English holds with her and emphasizes its importance with the metaphor, “It's my mother tongue.” She expands upon it in her statement right after; the use of parallelism between her description of her mother tongue, “Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery,” and its impact reinforcing, ”That was the language that helped shape the way I saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world.” Tan's inclusion of these childhood stories appeals to the reader’s sense of connection with her through the use of exemplification. This strategy focuses on Pathos by placing the reader in the author’s shoes and effectively conveying how, though difficult, growing up and living with these Englishes has molded her perspective on the power of

    Read More

  • American Born Chinese Thesis

    880 Words  | 4 Pages

    In the novel “American Born Chinese” by Gene Luen Yang (2006), it talks about three different people’s stories. The author starts off with telling a story about a monkey called the Monkey King, who lives in the jungle, seeking for higher power to become considered a god in the book. The author also tells a story about an American born Chinese boy named Jin Wang, who moves from San Francisco and struggles with fitting in at a new school. The last story the author tells is about a boy named Danny who has his cousin Chin-Kee from China visit every year. Danny ends up struggling to keep his reputation in adequate shape at school after his cousin visits causing him to switch schools often.

    Read More

  • Amy Tan Fish Cheeks Summary

    137 Words  | 1 Pages

    In "Fish Cheeks" by Amy Tan, the author utilizes the symbolic beige tweed miniskirt to represent the main characters yearning to be the same as American girls. After her parents invited her crushes family over for dinner she is apprehensive as to what he will presume about her traditional relatives and culture. The text states,"What will he think of our Shabby Chinese Christmas"(2). Which reveals that she wants to be like traditional Americans and doesn 't appreciate the unique differences about her culture. She also spends too much time caring about what the boy will think of her relatives and the non-american food served, that she doesn 't fancy over the fact that all her favorite foods were served.

    Read More

  • The Three Different Identities In American Born Chinese By Gene Luen Yang

    827 Words  | 4 Pages

    Jin is faced with being one of the very few Asians at his Junior High School, while everyone else is American. Of course Jin is going to feel out of sorts, especially when his teacher introduces him to the class as “Jin Jang”, and saying “He and his family moved to our neighborhood all the way from China”, when Jin’s real name is Jin Wang and his family moved from San Francisco (30). Gene Luen Yang uses this humility to display that it takes a considerable amount of open

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Tan And Hurston

    1409 Words  | 6 Pages

    Tan expresses the life experiences of Chinese immigrants to the United States and attempts to depict the relationship of a mother and daughter through her significant piece of writing ‘The Joy Club’. Therefore, all these authors somehow portrayed their early struggles and their view point towards life from their literary

    Read More

  • Fish In A Tree Quotes

    482 Words  | 2 Pages

    Everyone is smart in different ways. But if you judge a fish a fish by it’s ability to climb a tree, it will live it’s life believing it’s stupid. In your book, Fish in a Tree, the main character Ally was just like that fish, and was judged by the way she learned. She may have learned differently, but who says her way of learning was wrong? Taking this into consideration, I was able to make many more connections like this to myself and the world around me.

    Read More

  • The Importance Of Communication In The Joy Luck Club

    1225 Words  | 5 Pages

    Throughout the entire novel, the mothers and daughters face inner struggles, family conflict, and societal collision. The divergence of cultures produces tension and miscommunication, which effectively causes the collision of American morals, beliefs, and priorities with Chinese culture which

    Read More

  • Characterization In Amy Tan's 'Fish Cheeks'

    367 Words  | 2 Pages

    To begin with, both Tan and Crutcher utilize characterization to pursue the shared theme, that a strong sense of self is crucial when under the pressure of the expectation of others. In “Fish Cheeks” by Amy Tan, Amy feels propelled to conform because she feels judged for not being “normal”. Tan states, “What would Robert think of our shabby Chinese Christmas” (2). Also, it’s obvious Amy was self-conscious about the Chinese style of cooking and in this sentence she’s self-conscious because she says, “For Christmas I prayed for this blond-haired boy, and a slim new American nose”(1). In the first quote, she was over thinking and doubting that Robert would not like “our shabby Chinese Christmas” though in the end she was correct about Robert

    Read More

  • Amy Tan Fish Cheeks Analysis

    694 Words  | 3 Pages

    At the end of the dinner Amy's father burped loudly as it is a sign of respect towards the cook showing gratitude for the food. After everyone had left, Amy’s mother noticed her embarrassment all night and said “You want to be the same as American girls on the outside.” She the handed Amy an early gift, It was a beige tweed colored mini skirt. After she told Amy that she must always be Chinese on the inside and to be proud of who she was, because the only shame is to be ashamed. It took Amy years to truly figure out what her mother was trying to teach her, and after she figured it out she was proud of her ethnicity.

    Read More

  • Girl In Translation Jean Kwok Analysis

    1402 Words  | 6 Pages

    The narration beautifully illustrates the struggles of being pushed into a foreign world, where people look different, have other traditions, other norms, and speak an entirely different language. Based on her own childhood experiences as a migrant from Hong Kong, Jean Kwok tells the story of young and exceptionally intelligent Kimberly Chang who finds herself doing the splits between a life in Chinatown, wasting away as a sweatshop worker and living in a run-down apartment, and striving for a successful career at a fancy private school. Kimberly translates herself back and forth between a world where she can barely afford clothes and a world where, in spite of her intelligence, she 's supposed to look the part as she reaches for higher education. It is a tale of survival and beating the odds, but ultimately, it is also a fragile love story in an unforgiving environment. The narration is raw, honest, and authentic, with the Chinese culture being cleverly woven into the storyline.

    Read More

  • Amy Tan Research Paper

    737 Words  | 3 Pages

    Amy Tan is a Chinese-American author who was born on February 19, 1952, in Oakland, California. In Tan’s early life she had many struggles because her parents desired for her “to hold onto Chinese traditions and her own longings to become more Americanized” (Encyclopedia). While she wanted to become a writer when she was still young, her parents wanted her to become a neurosurgeon. When she got older and went to college she majored in English then started her career in the 1970’s. She was a technical writer and then started writing fiction stories.

    Read More

More about Painful Experiences In Amy Tan's Fish Cheeks

Open Document