Mother Tongue (Analyzing and Connecting)

Tara Link

English 1010

Haley Stokes

1/14/10

Mother Tongue (Analyzing and Connecting)

1. Tans attitude toward her mother changed from being ashamed of her, because of the way people treated her differently, and the way in which her mothers english could have almost had an effect on limiting Tans possibilities in life to... being more understanding of her mothers “broken” english. I believe her mother inspired her to write the way she did, so that people like her mother would be able to read it and understand it.

2. She explains how her mother is always judged because of her “broken” or “limited” english, and how it affects how people treat her, like at department stores, at banks, at restaurants, and other places like that. She give some great examples, the one I remember most is the hospital story. Her mother had had a CAT scan done that revealed a benign brain tumor, when she went to the hospital to find out more about it, they informed her that they had lost the CAT scan. Her mother using her best english tried to explain that her husband and son both died of brain tumors, and she wanted to know her diagnosis, the hospital showed no sympathy, and did not apologize once, but instead told her she would have to wait and make another appointment. Her mother then told them that they needed to call her daughter (Tan). Once they spoke to Tan, who spoke perfect english they told her how sorry they were for the mistake and made promises to fix it.

3. I believe it was important because she had a interest in language, and she wanted to be good at what she did, she also didn’t want to be like others and just go into math, accounting, or engineering. She was rebellious and stuck it out with writing. It was also so important because that is how she was able to write a book that people would understand better, and one that her mother understood.

4. I think imaging a reader is important because you need to know who your writing for, who is going to be reading your book, and if you have an idea of that, it is easier to write something. Something good that people will want to read. It is also important to understand how her mothers english is, and so by imagining her mother as a reader she was able to create a book that her mother was able to understand, and like.