The Fallacies on the American Dream in Two Kinds, a Short Story by Amy Tan

In the quick story “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, she writes about a youngster named Jing-mei and her experiences with her mother pushing her to turn into a prodigy, all although her mother deals with becoming a Chinese immigrant that just moved to the United States. The two nations naturally share really diverse cultures and this plays a part in the story as she pushes Jing-mei to live ‘The American Dream’. Her mother strongly believes that in America you can be what ever you want to be. This, to some, may possibly not be correct, even so this notion is strongly pushed in the Chinese culture. This is shown when Jing-mei fails to do any prodigious process that her mother puts in front of her which leads to her mother being in the end disappointed in Jing-mei. Her failures ends up causing a massive argument between Jing-mei and her mother. The argument could be called the climax of the story. This confrontation wouldn’t have happened if Jing-mei’s mother didn’t have the enormous notion that The American Dream is a legitimate thing, and Jing-mei’s mother wouldn’t have that perception of America if the Chinese culture didn’t present the United States as such a spot. Primarily based on Chinese culture and perspectives, there are quite a few fallacies concerning the American Dream, and these are displayed in Amy Tan’s brief story “Two Kinds”.

Chinese culture is naturally extremely different than the culture in the United States, and not a lot of Chinese citizens truly know what it is like to live in America. This could lead to the United States getting represented incorrectly. Most Chinese citizens have the impression that America is the land of dreams, and that you can go there and reside a effective life, make income and be famous but that’s not always accurate. According to an post written by Patrick Kim of tutorming.com there’s a huge list of shows that are well-known in China that are originally from the United States. The most well-known show on the list is a show referred to as The Large Bang Theory. In the show, there are 4 geeks who all have their PHDs and all do wacky items. Considering that this is a well-known show in China, a great percentage of the population is most likely watches the show. The show could very easily give off the impression to Chinese citizens hunting to immigrate to America that you can just come to the country and become a medical professional or scientist given that the show doesn’t show anything negative about America in terms of the economy. Chinese citizens would be filled with hope that their lives are changing only to be heartbroken and distraught when they uncover out that to grow to be a medical doctor they require $40,000 a year that they do not have simply because they didn’t bring any income with them from China. This is just one particular of several techniques that China falsely displays American life.

In addition to China presenting ‘The American Dream’ as a reputable life style, China also glorifies youngster prodigies. There’s several talent shows that are equivalent to America’s Got Talent and The X-Issue that usually feature youngsters performing songs and gaining fame from being on national television. On the Chinese talent show titled Remarkable Chinese, there’s a viral video of Zhang Junhao, a three year old boy, doing some dance moves that obviously makes the crowd enjoy him. There’s an article on pri.org that is written by Emily Lodish. In the article, Emily states “He’s got the judges consuming out of the palm of his hand and an complete audience swooning.”She says that Zhang can do something that no 3 year old ought to know how to do, and that is playing an audience. Ahead of the performance, he says to the judges “When I dance, my mom laughs. My mom says laughing is happiness. My dream is to make men and women pleased due to the fact I am content. Are you satisfied?” This undoubtedly isn’t something that a toddler should be in a position to do naturally, which could only mean that he was taught how to do this by a person. His parents or parent could have clearly pushed Zhang to dance incredibly challenging till he had it mastered, and then told him just what to tell the judges to get that nice heartwarming feeling out of the efficiency. This is just a single of numerous examples of Chinese parents forcing their kid to do some sort of prodigious activity, which leads me to my subsequent point.

In Amy Tan’s short story Two Sorts, Jing-mei’s mother forces her to do all sorts of prodigious tasks so that her daughter can be the ideal daughter and be all sorts of talented. The only concern is that Jing-mei fails at all of the tasks that are place in front of her and makes her mother extremely disappointed. Just like when speaking about Zhang Junhao’s dance performance, his mother most most likely was forcing him to do all of that, just like when Jing-mei’s mother was forcing her to play the piano and carry out in the talent show where she ended up embarrassed herself. Looking back at my first paragraph, Jing-mei’s parents have been immigrants who moved to America straight from China for the sole objective of finding and living a greater life for their family. Jing-mei’s mother had the concept of the “American Dream” in her head even though moving to America, since she believed that she could do something in America.

In conclusion, it is not unusual for Chinese culture to falsely present the United States as the Disneyland of countries to live in, but it brings false hope to immigrants who come from China expecting the holy grail of a wealthy life. They come to a new country, hoping to begin living “The American Dream” however finish up obtaining eventually disappointed.. It also gives parents the notion that they can make their kids turn into a child prodigy and become the best child given that they show Chinese versions of American reality shows on television networks.