In the essay ‘Mother Tongue’ (Tan 1990) it is portrayed that Amy Tan is an Asian American writer. She comes from a cultural background where English is not the main language spoken. This reflected her upbringing as she was raised in a country where English was the first language. This experience reflected her relationship within the language and her daily life. Amy Tan perceives language as ‘’The way it can evoke an emotion‚ a visual image‚ a complex ideal or a simple truth.’’ (Tan‚ 1990‚ pg.1) This
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Mother-tongue Education in South Africa - Andrew Foley Introduction The question of mother-tongue education in South Africa remains a vexed one. On the one hand‚ it seems reasonable and desirable that learners should be able to receive education in their mother-tongue‚ if they so wish. On the other hand‚ there are some very real difficulties involved in the implementation of this ideal. The purpose of this paper is to clarify what these difficulties are‚ and then to suggest what
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In “Mother tongue” by Amy Tan talks about her experience as a young child whose mother didn’t speak “proper” English; She Described her mother language as “Broken”. Tan recalls often having to translate for her mother in various time. She found herself feeling embarrassed of the way her mom spoke. One-day Tan was delivering a speech when she noticed her mom was in the crowded and it was the first time her mom heard her talk with such big words. After that she noticed she articulates different with
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In the story “Aria” by Richard Rodriguez and “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan both authors write about their experiences and struggles as a bilingual child. In “Aria” and “Mother Tongue” they describe their private language as an expression of intimacy with their loved ones. Growing up at one point they felt embarrassed and ashamed of their parents inability to speak English fluently. Tan writes “My mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English‚” (Tan 543). They
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In the essay “Mother Tongue”‚ the author Amy Tan presents the process that she turned the negative impact of her mother’s “limited” English to the positive influence of her writing style. First‚ Tan introduces herself and her writing. She is a writer who uses all kinds of English that she is familiar with in her writing. Furthermore‚ she mentions that she realizes lately that the way she talks with her family is different from the way she communicates with others. Tan goes on to write about
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Summary—Mother Tongue Amy Tan considers language a thought-provoking and powerful tool. Her mother‚ an Asian American‚ speaks “Chinglish" all her life‚ which exerts a huge impact on Tan’s language ability. Despite all the misunderstanding and limitation of her mother’s language‚ Tan perceives it as natural‚ intimate and meaningful. When Tan gave a talk to people about her book‚ she realized it was the first time she talked to her mother in standard English‚ which Tan rarely used with her before.
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Losing our Language: The Deterioration of the English Language The English language has and continues to rapidly evolve within the United States and around different places throughout the world. Even though there is uniformity in the Standard English language‚ it also exists in many varieties such as dialects and registers as stated by John Algeo in The Origins and Development of the English Language. Dialects are a variety of languages that are associated with a specific place‚ social level‚ ethnic
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can do better job in the second language than their mother language. In the article Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue”‚ Amy Tan emphasized her idea that we speak different languages unconsciously and we are categorized by the way we talk. The author talked about her mother who is a Chinese emigrant wanted to provide her daughter a better environment to grow up and spoke “broken” and “limited” English‚ but anyway‚ Amy can still communicate with her mother without obstacles. Throughout the story Amy Tan uses
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Tame a Wild Tongue and Amy Tan in Mother Tongue both share a similar message in their essays‚ they argue that every single culture faces different language obstacles when learning the english language. Both struggle to develop the correct form of english‚ the one considered acceptable by society. Both Tan and Anzaldua teach us about their ethnic backgrounds‚ in an effort to better help us learn of their struggles. Amy Tan‚ is of asian descent‚ and tells us how growing up with a mother who spoke “broken
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between government and private English medium schools. In the name of mother tongue the state and the upper caste elite always compel the regional medium of instruction in the policy making. This was one of the current problems in Indian Educational system. This paper can be divided into four parts. The first part will highlight the language policy after Indian Independence. The second part discusses the concept of mother tongue and its importance in the contextualizing of educational discourse in
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