Mother Tongue by Amy Tan is a short story that discloses the author’s thoughts on the role of the language being spoken as a native or a second language in the life of a speaker. The story brings awareness to the widespread bias towards the Asian community and other origins, who mostly appear to be immigrants who speak English. The quality of what they say is not changed by the way they speak the language.
The false idea that they have a poor understanding of the events leads to adaptation problems and non-acceptance by others. The writer transmits this prevailing issue through the example stories capturing her own mother, who is a Chinese immigrant with an ‘imperfect’ pronunciation of English. It adds her credibility as Tan knows from her own experience what it means to be an Asian English speaker and who has a tight relationship with the ‘victim’ of such prejudiced behavior.
Tan wants to deliver the idea that the worth of what a person is saying should not depend on the way he or she is speaking the language. People are often biassed towards people who do not speak English as their native language.
They are prone to not consider them seriously and even question their intellectuality. When, as a matter of fact, the fact that the pronunciation is unclear does not have anything to do with an individual’s logic, understanding, and level of attitude. Tan raises a serious matter of why there are very few of those whose mother tongue is not English but who have studied the language for many years working in the sphere of English language literature (Tan, 2006). This problem touches many representatives of Asian and non-Asian immigrants who are not accepted by society due to their ‘broken’ language.
In the same manner, the author attempts to spread a non-oppressive message through her words by telling the readers not to discriminate against people on the way they communicate in a language. Additionally, she attempts to convey the notion that language brings individuals closer. The “broken” English that she developed, similar to other numerous foreigners, made the bond with her mother stronger, despite the fact that she was not perceived by locals because of her incapacity to talk smoothly.
For instance, when her mother was afraid that her stockbroker was trying to fool her regarding the payment, she had to ask her daughter to show her indignation to the stockbroker and speak to him in her stead (Tan, 2006). This was a forced action since she knew that the stockbroker would not consider her complaints because of the influent pronunciation. This and other cases where the daughter had to act as a mediator between her mother and a native English speaker illustrate the difficulty of immigrants to adjust to life in an English-speaking country.
In conclusion, Tan demonstrates that her mother is a very knowledgeable person in several life aspects and the language itself. She reads respectable journals and English literature and can fully comprehend the modern trends or how to proficiently work with her stocks (Tan, 2006). The writer shows that people’s idea of the connection between the presence of a notable accent in the language and a person’s intellect and a level of comprehension of the language is baseless by giving these real-life examples.
Reference
Tan, Amy. Mother Tongue. READ, 2006. Web.