NOEL PERRIN

Noel Perthi u-as ho,,, in 1927 in New )‘irk City. He receired degrees/10/11 Williaiiis College, Duke 1’,iii’ersitv, and Cai,ihridge lj,,i,’ersnv.The (10110)1 o/ 111(11/V honks (leaIiIn4 u-ui thenes 0/ nature, ecology, (1/idNew Euigland, Perri,i is nell kuion’,i Ii’r Giving Up the Gun: Japan’sReversion to the SwoicI, 1543—I $79 and four collectuoiis o/ ecsavc iniiw Fjr’t fle,son Rural” se,ies. Recent piihlucaio,is iiwliide ii1 articleii Vermont Lile about electric cars; a guide, in the Chronicle olHigher Education, to colleges /i,ciised on envlronlneiltal prote.’Iuoll;

and 1)00k reuuews 10 the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times.Peru,, is a /011/icr chair of the English department at Dariniouih.

The Androgynous Man

‘The Aiidiogv,iotis Ma,i” [i/st appeared iii ihc’ New York TimesSi, iidav Inapazille as part o/a series called “A/,o, ti Mc,i.” Iii the essayPeru,, exphiues his idea of spiritual a,idrogvnv : a crossing ou’er in

split! hea,’ec,, the masculine and /emmnm,ine real,nc, /ms’eing the sellfm//i laniimumg expeclatiomis aiid roles.

The summer I was sixteen, I took a train from New York to SteamboatSprings, Colorado, where I was going to be assistant horse wianglerat a camp. The trip took three days, and since I was much too shy tot ilk to sti in.ci s I Ii id gultc u lot ol time loi ic idin_ I i e uI ill ol(; n’iih the 11,,u/. I i-cad all the interesting articles in a coupleol magazines I had, and then I went back and read all the dull stuf.

also took all the quizzes, a thing ol which magazines were evenluller then t han low.

I’he one that held my undivided attention was called FlowMasculine/Feminine Are You? It consisted oh a laige number ofi ukblots. The jeader as supposed to decide which oh the I ourobjecis each blot most resembled. The choices might be a cloud, asteam engine, a caterpillar and a sohi.

Vv’hcn I hlnished the test, I was shocked to hInd that I was baielvmasculine at all. On a scale oh I to 10, I was about a 1 .2. Me, the horsewrangler? (And not just ‘a ranglet; cithei: That summei; I had to skina couple oh horses that died-—-— the camp owner wanted the hides.)

246

PERRIN/Tut! ANDROGYNOUS MAN 247

The results of the test were so terrifying to me that for the first 4

time in in life I did picce ol oi igm il in ilysis Ha ing unlimitedtime on the train, I looked at the “masculine” answers over and over,trying to find what it was that distinguished real men from peoplelike me—and eventually I discovered two very simple patterns. Itwas “masculine” to think the blots looked like man-made objects and“feminine” to think they looked like natural objects. It was masculine to think they looked like things capable of causing harm, andfeminine to think of innocent things.

Even at sixteen, I had the sense to see that the compilers of the stest were using rather limited criteria — maleness and femalenessare both more complicated than that —and I breathed a huge sigh ofrelief. I wasn’t necessaril a wimp, after all,

That the test did reveal something other than the superficiality ofits makers I realized only many years later. What it revealed was thatthere is a large class of men and women both, to which I belong, whoare essentially androgynous. That doesn’t mean we’re gay, or low inthe appropriate hormones, or uncomfortable performing the jobstraditionally assigned our sexes. (A few years after that summer, Iwas leading troops in combat and, unfashionable as it now is toidmit this h iing i ‘cry good time ar is exciting Whit i pity thetwentieth century went and spoiled it with high-tech weapons.)

What it does mean to be spiritually androgynous is a kind of freedom. Men who are all-male, or he-man, or 100 percent red—bloodedAmericans, have a little biological set that causes them to be attractedto physical powei; and probably also to dominance. Maybe even towatching football. I don’t say this to criticize them. Completely masculine men are quite often wonderful people: gond husbands, good(although sometimes overwhelming) fathers, good members of society. Furthermore, they are often so unsellconsciously at ease in theworld that other men seek to imitate them. They just aren’t as free asus androgynes. They pretty nearly have to be what they are; we havea range of choices open.

The sad part is that many of us never discover that. Men who are 8

not 100 percent red-blooded Americans—say, those who are only75 percent red-blooded—often fail to notice their Freedom. Theyare too busy trying to copy the he-men ever to realize that men, likewomen, come in a wide variety of acceptable types. Why this frantic imitation? My answer is mere speculation, but not casual. I havespeculated on this for a long time.

Partly they’re just envious of the he-man’s unconscious ease.Mostly they’re terrified of finding that there may be something

248 DEFINITiON

wrong with them deep down, some weakness at the heart. To avoiddiscovering that, they spend their lives acting out the role that thehe—man naturally lives. Sad.

One thing that men owe to the women’s movement is that this iokind of failure is less common than it used to be. In releasing themselves from the single ideal of the dependent woman, women havemore or less incidentally released a lot of men from the single idealof the dominant male. The one mistake the feminists have made, Ithink, is in supposing that all men need this release, or that theworld would be a better place if all men achieved it. It wouldn’t. Itwould just be duller.

So far I have been pretty vague about just what the freedom of an ii

androgynous man is. Obviously it varies with the case. In the case Iknow best, my own, I can be quite specific. It has freed me most asa parent. I am, among other things, a fairly good natural mothet: I

like the nurturing role. It makes me feel good to see a child eat —andit turns me to mush to see a four-year-old holding a glass with bothsmall hands, in order to drink. I even enjoyed sewing patches on theknees of my daughter Amy’s Di: Dentons when she was at the crawling stage. All that pleasure I would have lost if I had made myselfstick to the notion of the paternal jole that I started with.

Or take a smaller and rather ridiculous example. I feel free to kiss i

cats. Until recently it never occurred to me that I would want to,though my daughters have been doing it all their lives. But my elderdaughter is now twenty—two, and in London. Of course, I get to lookafter her cat while she is gone. He’s a big, handsome farm cat namedPetrnshka, ver unsentimental, though used from kittenhood to

( bun kISsLd on thL top of thE he iii by Elii ibrth [vc gotten ‘&r’ fondof him (he the adventurous kind of cat who likes to climb hills withyou), and one night I simply felt like kissing him on the top of thehead, and did. Why did no one tell me sooner how silky cat fur is?

Then there’s my relation to cars. I am completely unembarrassed 1:

by my inability to diagnose even minor problems in whatever object1 happen to be driving, and don’t have to make some insider’s remarkto mechanics to try to establish that I, too, am a “Man with HisMachine.”

The same ease extends to household maintenance. I do it, of

course. Service people are expensive. But for the last decade myhouse has functioned better than it used to because I’ve had the aidof a volume called Home Repairs Aim Woman Can Do, which ispitched just right for people at my technical level. As a youth, I’d as

IF A\DR0(;YNOI:s SiAN 249

Si H m have ii )uclred sr ich a hook as I would have become a transves

tite. Even thou h common sense says there is really nothiu sexualsvhatsoi’ver about fixint!. sinks.

Or take public emotion. All nrv fife I have easily been moved bycertain kinds of voices. The actress Siobhan McKenna,’ to take aiii tahle case. Give her an emotional scene in a play, and within tenwords my eyes are full of tears. In boy hood, my great dread was thatsomeone might notice. I struggled manfully, you might say, to suppress this weakness, Now, ol course, 1 don’t see it was a weakness atall, but as a kind of fulfillment. I even suspect that the true he-menfeel he same way, or one kind of them does, at. least, and its only thepoor imitators who have to struggle to repress themselves.

Let me come back to the inkblots, with their assumption that mas— 6culine equates with machinery and science, and feminine with art andnat iire. I have no idea svliet her the richt pronoun for God is I—Ic, Sheor It - But this I’m pretty stile of. it G id could somehow be induced totake t fiat test, G d wotrid not come out macho, and not feminismo,cit lier but ijght in the rrirddle. Fellow androgs nes. it’s a nice I hought.

• In paragraph a Perrin writes that “there is a large class of men arid\vornen both, to which I belong, who are essentially androgsrious.”What does andmgvuo,r mean? Is Perrin at ease with his androgynousidentity?

2. In paragraphs 7—9 Perrrn defines ma;thoml across a kind of range or

‘-p’(-tninI What is this spectrum, and how does it relate to the inkblottest he describes in his opening paragraphs?

3. In paragraph It) Pert in claims that men owe a debt to the women snioverilerit. Explain what lie beliees feririnists have eontmihmrted tosociety’s understanding of manhood.

Puipose cuil ,‘luthencL’

• Vvhv do sou think Perirn rote this essay? Was he ting to justify or

come to terms s rth his own masculinity? if riot, what was he tryingto do?

2. in his conclusion (paragraph 16), Perrin speaks directl to his “Fellowandrogynes.” What does this suggest about Perrin’s vision of hisreaders?

Siohf ran McKenna (t923—86) was an irish stage and movie actress. [Editornore.

250 DEFiNITION

3. How do you think Perrin expects his audience to react to this essay?Does he seem to assume his audience’s agreement, does he writedefensively to forestall criticism, or does he assume some otherresponse? What in the essay makes you think as von do?

Method and Structure

I. Why is definition an appropriate method for Perrin to use in developing his ideas? What specific features of this method serve him?

2. In developing his definition, Perrin relies heavily on personal anecdotes. What do the anecdotes contrihute to his essay? Do they weakenhis case in any way?

3. Other Methods In what ways does Per-rin use comparison and contrast as part of his rlefiniti n? Why is this method important in developing his point?

Language

• Perrin’s vocabulary in this essay ranges from relatively formal tohighly informal. For example, in paragraph 5 he uses the phrase“rather limited criteria” as well as the word “wimp,” Vv’hat does thisrange of vocabulary suggest about Perrin’s role as a writer here?

2. In paragraph 8 Perrin writes that the point he is making is merespeculation, but not casual. ‘What does he mean?

3. Point out sonic examples that show Perrin appealing to his readerssense of humor What is the ef feet of these examples?

Writing Topics

L In an essa define ;,uinlioal or ii’o;iini,Iiovd. Does your definition cot’—

respond to traditional assoniptions about gender or is it mole likePerrin’s? Vvhat chai’acterislics does your definition ho! include?

2. Based on your own experience, write an essay in vliicli von define astereotype von have encountered, not necessarily a gender stereotype.Examples include assumptions about jocks, tecluies, persons in wheelchairs, persons who are thin or hcav or have otfier physical characteristics, or racial differences.

3. Despite the societal changes Perrin refers to, many gender-i’elatedissues continue to lie a source of controversy and debate: coeducationversus gendeispecific classrooms, discrepancies between men’s andwomens earnings, what constitutes sexual harassment, parental roleswithin the family, gender stereotypes in the media, and so on. Chooseone such controversy that interests von, and in an essay explore itsvarious sides as well as your own position.

GLORIA NAYLOR

Ati i,,i,’nctm ,oi’clrt and essayist. (dana Navhir was horn iti /950 ill

\‘w thrk City. .5/ic served as a lInssioltarv for Ji’hovah Witttt’sscsfrom 1967 to 1975 and then worked as a hotel telephone operator until/981 1/tat ar shi graduakd from Btooklsn Colkt,c of the Cit’, of

New Yàrk with a BA and went oil to do graduate work in AfricanAinirican studies at )ilc University. Since receivilig an MA front hue,Valor has published five tto’,’el.s dealing with the varied histories atud1u/esivles open lumped to”ether as “the black esperietuce”: The Women

f Brewster Place (1Q82), about the lives ofcigIit black u’onieti, which11,011 i/it’ Aiitt’ricaii 1300k Aui’aid for fU’tioii and was itiade into a telei’i—sio,u llun’ie; Linden I lills ( J9$S), about a black ,,nddle-cla.ss neighb1 urhood; Mama Da (/988), about a Georgian woniatu wit/i visioliutrt’

powers; Bailey’s Cafe (1992), about a group of people whose lives areat crossroads; and The Men of Brewster Place (1997), about the menwhose lives intersect those oft/ic woolen of Brewster Place.

The Meanings of a Word

Recalling out experience as a third—grader leads iVavlor to probe theuiieaiiiiigs of (I inglilu St’Iisitil’e word. A! tlit’ saute tune she exploit’slion’ words acquits’ their meanings fmni use. This essay first appearedin the New York limes in 1986.

Lanutuage is the snhject. It is the written form with which I’ve managed to keep the wolf away from the door and, in diaries, to keep mysanity. In spite of this, I consider the written word inferior to the spoken, and much of the frustration experienced by novelists is theawareness that whatever we manage to capture in even the mosttranscendent passages falls far short of the richness of life. Dialogueachieves its power in the dynamics of a fleeting moment of sight,sound, smell, and touch.

I’m not going to enter the debate here about whether it is language that shapes reality or vice versa. The battle is doomed to bewaged whenever we seek intermittent reprieve from the chicken andegg dispute. [will simply take the position that the spoken word, likethe written word, amounts to a nonsensical arrangement of sounds

251

252 DEFINITION

or letters without a consensus that assigns “meaning” And building1mm the meaniugs ni what we hear, we order reality. Words themselves are innocuous; it is the consensus that gives them true power.

I remember the fIrst time I heard the word iiigger. In my third—grade class, our math tests were l)eing passed down the rows, and asI handed the papers to a little boy in back of me, I remarked thatonce again he had received a much lower ITiark tilaLi I did. [-Icsnatched his test horn me and spit out that word. had he called mea nymphomaniac or a necrophiliac, I couldn’t have been more puzzled. I didnt know what a nigger was, hut I knew that whatever itmeant, it was something he shouldn’t have called me. This was verified when I raised my hand, and in a loud voice repeated what hehad said and watched the teacher scold hini for using a ‘bad” word.I was later to go home and ask the inevitable question that everyblack parent must face—’Mommy, what does Digger mean?’

And what exactly did it mean? Thinking hack, I realize that this 4

could not have been the first time the word was used in my presence.I was part of a large extended family that had migrated from therural South after Worki War 11 and formed a close—knit network thatgravitated around my maternal grandparents. Their ground-floorapartment in one of the buildings they owned in Harlem was a weekend mecca for my immediate family, along with countless aunts,uncles, and cousins who brought along assorted friends. It was abustling and open house with assorted neighbors and tenants popping in arid out to exchange bits of gossip, pick up an old quarrel, orreferee the ongoing checkers game in which my grandmother cheatedshamelessly. They were all there to let down their hair and put uptheir feet after a week of labor in the factories, laundries, and ship—yards of New York.

Amid t he clamor, which could reach deafening proportions twoor three conversations going on simultaneously, punctuated by thesound of a babvs dying somewhere in the back rooms or out on thestreet -—- there was still a rigid set of mules about what was said andhow. Older children were sent out of the living room hemi it wastime to get into the juicy details about on—know—who up on thethird floor who had gone and gotten herself “p—r-e—g—n—a—n—t!” But my

parents, knowing that I could spell well beyond my years, alwaysdemanded that I lollow the others out to pla Beyond sexual misconduct and death, everything else was considered harmless for ouryoung ears. And so among the anecdotes of the triumphs and disap

pointments in the various workings of their lives, the word iligger was

\\ LoR! ritr 1LANl\CS ((F \ \VOki 2

used in my presence, but it as set within contexts and inflectionsticit c;iitsed it to reeister in nv mind as ome thing else.

In the singular, I lie vuid as always applied to a niaii vho had(ll’u iIF’Iiislit_(_i littitsell lii Si 111W sit(l.itiOIl I ii:it hiought I lieu approvalmi his stieiii’tli, iitelligL’iice, ni drive:

‘‘I)id Johnny ((‘(I//V il that’ 7

I in ft Hin,. ‘out thi it IlL Lcl piilbrd ill t) 000 oh O\i I tutu. list \i. ii

Sail lie got eiinnghi toi a down pavlnelit oil a house.When used ith a jxissessiVe adjective by a wonlan— iiw nigger

it became a terFu (if eiideatinent lot her husband or ho friend. Rut it

could be mole thi;ui list a [cmi applied to a nian, in their mouths it

became the pine essence of manhood—a disembodied force thatchanneled their past history of struggle and present survival againsthe odds into a victi irions statement (>1 being: “Yeah, that old kweman

lound out qnick eiioueh -—— von don’t mess with a uigger:’In the plural, it became a description of some group within the ig

comrnurutv that had overstepped the bounds of decency as myfamily defined it. Parents who neglected their children, a drunkencouple who fought in public, people who simply refused to look orwork, those \Vi t h excessively dirty months or u nkempt householdswere all “trifling ii iggers” This particular circle could krgive hard

I mes, unemployment , the occasional bout of depression—theyhad gone through all of that themselves but the unforgivable sinwas a lack of sell-respect.

A woman could newt’ be a “nigger” in the singulam; with its con— ii

notation ol c infii’nung worth, The noun iri was its closest equivalentin that sense, bitt unIv \\ lien used in direct address and regardless oltile gender doing t lie addressing. Girl was a token of respect for a\v( mali. ‘l’he nne-svllmhie word was drawn out to sound like t lilee iniccognit ion ol tile e\tla 01111cc (if \\ it, imei”,ie, or dating that the womanhad shown in the sitl,iation under discussion,

“(1—i—i—I, stop. ‘oii mean von said that to his lace?’’Hut il the \oiId was used in a thi’d—person reference or sliomtcnecl II

so hat it almost snapped out ol the mouth, it alwas involved someclement of conmintnial disappmoal. And age became au important

factor in these exchanges. It was only between individuals of thesame generation, ot’ horn any older person to a younger (but never

tile other av around), that ni would he considered a compliment.I dont agree wih the argument that use of the word nimger at this 14

social stratum of the black community was an internalization of

ricisnu ‘lime dynamics were tile exact opposite: the people in mygiandmothei’s living i’oom took a word that whites used to signify

2S4 urriNiiION

worthlessness or degradation and rendered it impotent. Gatheringthere together, they transformed nigger to signify the varied and complex human beings they knew themselves to he. If the word was todisappear totally from the rnoi iths of even the most liberal of whitesociety, no one in that room was naive enough to believe it would disappear from white minds. Meeting the word head-on, they proved ithad absolutely nothing to do with the way they were determined tolive their lives.

So there must have been dozens ol times that ligger was spoken nin front of me helore I reached the third grade. But I didn’t “hear” ituntil it was said by a small pail ul lips that had already learned itcould he a way to humiliate me. That was the word I went home andasked my mother about. And since she knew that I had to gnnv upin America, she took me in her lap and explained.

lieu iii; ig

Na’.lor writes that ‘the spoken word, like the written word, amountsto a nonsensical arrangement ot sounds or letters without a consensus that assirns meaning’’ ( pariimuph 2). Explain this statement inoi.ir own words, I-[ow did this statement apply to the word IIu.gg.’r louthe vounL’ Naylur?

2. What is Navlor’s main idea? Where dues she express it?

3. In paragraph 14 Navloi’ disagrees ith those ho claim that the;frican American cornrnunitvs use ol the teim ,lg,’Ly’r constitutes “aninternalization (it racism.” What alternative explanation (lies sheolfei? Do you agiec with her iuteipictatiou? Why, or In not?

Purpose and Audience

What is Naylor purpose or puiposes in writing this essay: to expressherself? to explain something? to convince readers of something?Support your answer by referring to passages trom the essay.

2. Naylor’s essay first appeared in the Nm’ Ybrk limes, a daily newspaper whose readers are largely middle-class whites, in what ways doesshe seem to consider and address this audience?

Method and Structure

1. Why is Navlor’s choice of the method of defInition especially appropriate given the point she is trying to make about language?

2. Naylor supports her main idea by defining two words, nigger and girl.What factors influence the various meanings of each word?

SAYL0R/fliE Mt/ANINCS OF A wotu 255

3 N i br s css iv is divickd into sr coons c ich ronO ibuting somethingdifferent to the whole. Identify the sections and their functions.

4. Other Methods Like many writers of defInition, Navior employs anumber of other met hods of development: for instance, in paragraphs4 and 5 she describes the atmosphere of her grandparents apartment;in 8, 9, and 12 she cites examples of speech; arid in I 1—13 she compares and contrasts the two uses of girl, At two points in the essayNaybor relies on a narrative of the same incident, Where, and for whatPurpose?

Language

1. How would you describe the lone of Naylor’s essay? Steady and reasoned, or impassioned? Is the style more academic or more informal?Do you find Navlor’s tone and style appropriate given her subject mattel’? Why?

2. In paragraph 3 Navlor uses language to convey a child’s perspective. Forexample, she seems to become the arrogant little girl who “remarkedthat once again he had received a much lower mark than I did.” Locatethree or four other uses of language in the essay that emphasize herseparation from the world of adults. How does this perspective comtribute to the effect of the essay?

3. In paragraph 14 Naylor concludes that her lamilv used iligger “to signil y the varied and complex human beings they knew themselves tobe,” ‘T’his variety and complexity is demonstrated through the wordsand expressions she uses to describe life in her grandparents’ home—“a weekend mecca,” “a bustling and open house” (4). Cite five or sixother examples ol concrete, vivid language in this description.

Writing lopics

Using your own experiences for examples, write an essay modeled onNavlor’s in which von define “the meanings of a word” (or words).The word you choose might be a stereotype based on ethnicity, gendci; appearance, or income, for example. Have you found, like Navbor,that meaning varies with context? If so, make the variations clear.

2. A recent grassroots movement tried but failed to have the word nig—gel’ removed 1mm dictionaries, Are there some words Si) hateful thatthey should he banned Irom the language? Or is such an attempt tocontrol language even more objectionable? Wi’ite an essay that statesarid supports your answers, giving plenty of examples.

3. About African Americans’ use of the word Iligger, Naybor writes that“the people in my grandmother’s living room took a word that whitesused to signif’v worthlessness or degradation and rendered it impotent”

256 DEFINITION

(paragraph 14), Write an essay in which you discuss a symbol, a trait,or another word that has been used negatively by one group towardanother but has been transformed by the Largeted group into a positivemeaning. Examples include the gay communitys use ol the word queerand the Jewish community’s reclaiming of the Star ol David after theNazis used the symbol to stigmatize Jews. How did the definition of thesymbol, trait, or word change from one community to another? LikeN u br p o Idc I r idu s wIth r\ mples th u cl u ik sout ddlnltlons

AMY TAN

Amy Tan was born in 1952 in Oakland, ‘alifi,rnia, the daughter ofchinese immigrants. She grew up in northern California andmajored in English and linguistics at San Jose State University,where she received a BA and an MA. Thns first career was as a business writet crafting corporate reports and executives’ speeches.Dissatisfied with her work, she began writing fiction 11cr first book,The Joy Luck Club (1989), a critical and popular success, is a seriesof interrelated stories about the bonds between immigrant Chinesemothers and their American-horn daughters. Since The Joy LuckClub was published, she has written three more novels: The KitchenGod’s Wife (1991), The Hundred Secret Senses (1995), and TheBonesetter’s Daughter (2001).

Mother Tongue

In this essay, Tan defines her sense ofa mother tongue, exploring theversions of English that she has used as a daugltter a student, and awriter The essay was first published in Threepenny Review in 1990.

I am not a scholar of English or literature, I cannot give you muchmore than personal opinions on the English language and its variations in this country or others.

I am a writer. And by that definition, I am someone who has alwaysloved language. I am fascinated by language in daily life, I spend agreat deal of my time thinking about the power of language—the wayit can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simpletruth. Language is the tool of my trade. And I use them all—all theEnglishes I grew up with.

Recently, I was made keenly aware of the different Englishes I do 3

use. I was giving a talk to a large group of people, the same talk I hadalready given to half a dozen other groups. The nature of the talkwas about my writing, my life, and my book, The Joy Luck Club. Thetalk was going along well enough, until I remembered one major difference that made the whole talk sound wrong. My mother was inthe room. And it was perhaps the first time she had heard me give alengthy speech, using the kind of English I have never used with her.

257

I)iHNI ON

I was saying things like, ‘The intersection of memory upon imagination and “There is an aspect ol my fiction that relates to thus—md thus — i speech hued with c ircfullv wiought giammiticalphrases, burdened, it suddenly seemed to me, with nominalizedforms, past perfect tenses, conditional phrases, all the lorms olStandard English that I had learned in school and through books,the krms of English I did not use at home with my mother.

Just last week, I was walking down the street with my mother, and 4I again found myself conscious of the English I was using, and theEnglish 1 do use with her We were talking about the price of newand used furniture and I heard myself saying this: “Not waste moneythat way.” Mv husband was with us as well, and he didn’t notice anyswitch in my English. And then I realized why. Is because over thetwenty years we’ve been together I’ve often used that same kind ofEnglish with him, and sometimes he even uses it with me, It hashecome our language of intimacy, a different suit ul English thatrelates to family talk, he language I grew up with.

So you’ll have some idea of what this family talk I heard soundslike, I’ll quote what my mother said during a recent conversation

Ii icli I videotaped and then transcribed. During this conversation,my mother was talking about a political gangster in Shanghai whohad the same last name as her family’s, Du, and how the gangster inhis early years wanted to he adopted by her family, which was rich

comparison. Later the gangster became more powerful, far richerhan my mothers am ilv, and one day showed tip at my mothers

wedding to pay his respects. Here’s what she said in part:“Do Yusong having business like fruit stand. Like off the street 6

kind. He is like Dii Zong — but not Tsung-ming Island people. Theh e il peoph. e ill puton the i ie e ist side he bJon to iii it side

S lot. if pLOpk Th it m in w mt to isk Du Zong f ithei t ike him in likLbecome own family. Dii Zong father wasn’t look down on him. hutdidn’t take seriously, until that man big like become a mafia. Nowimportant person, very hard to inviting him. Chinese vav came onlyto show respect, don’t stay for dinner Respect for making big celebration, he shows up. Mean gives lots of respect. Chinese custom.Chinese social life that way. If too important wont have to stay toofong. He conic to my wedding. didn’t see. I heard it. I gone to boysside, they have YMCA dinner. Chinese age I was nineteen.”

You should know that my mother’s expressive command of En- 7glish belies how much she actually understands. She reads theIuthe report, listens to Wall Siicei t1’’ek, converses daily with herstockbrokei; reads all of Shirley MacLame’s books with ease—all

TAS/ MOTtlER TONGUE 259

kinds of things I can’t begin to understand. Yet some of my friendstell me they understand fIfty percent of what my mother says. Somesay they understand eighty to ninety percent. Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, mymother’s English is perfectly clear, perfectly natural, It’s my mothertongue. Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observationand imagery. That was the language that helped shape the way I sawthings, expressed things, made sense of the world.

Lately, I’ve been giving more thought to the kind of English my 8

mother speaks. Like others, 1 have described it to people as “broken”or “fractured” English. But I wince when I say that. It has alwaysbothered me that I can think of no way to describe it other than “broken,” as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed, as if it lacked a certain wholeness and soundness. I’ve heard other terms used, “limitedEnglish,” for example. But they seem just as bad, as if everything islimited, including people’s perceptions of the limited English speaker.

I know this for a fact, because when I was growing up, nw mother’s 9

“limited” English limited my perception of her I was ashamed of herEnglish. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what shehad to say. That is, because she expressed them imperfectly herthoughts were imperfect. And I had plenty of empirical evidence to support me: the fact that people in department stores, at banks, and atrestaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her

My mother has long realized the limitations of her English as iowell. When I was fifteen, she used to have me call people on thephone to pretend I was she. In this guise, I was forced to ask forinformation or even to complain and yell at people who had beeniiide to her. One time it was a call to her stockbroker in New York.She had cashed out her small portfolio and it lust so happened wewere going to go to New York the next week, our very first trip outside California. I had to get on the phone and say in an adolescentvoice that was not very convincing, “This is Mrs. Tan.”

And my mother was standing in the back whispering loudly, “Why ii

he don’t send me check, already two weeks late. So mad he lie to me,losing me money.”

And then I said in perfect English, “Yes, I’m getting rather con- 12

cerned, You had agreed to send the check two weeks ago, but it hasn’tarrived.”

Then she began to talk more loudly. “What he want, I come to New 13

York tell him front of his boss, you cheating me?” And I was trying to

260 DEFINiTiON

calm her down, make her be quiet, while telling the stockbroker, “I

____

can’t tolerate any more excuses. If I don’t receive the check immediately I ‘im gomg to havc to spLak to oui managcr whcn I m in NessYork next week,” And sure enough, the following week there we werein front of this astonished stockbroker, and I was sitting there redfaced and quiet, and my mothei; the real Mrs. Tan, was shouting athis boss in her impeccable broken English.

We used a similar routine just five days ago, for a situation that 4

was far less humorous. My mother had gone to the hcspital for anappointment, to find out about a benign brain tumor a CAT scan hadrevealed a month ago. She said she had spoken very good English,her best English, no mistakes. Still, she said, the hospital did notapologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan and she hadcome for nothing. She said they (lid not seem to have any sympathywhen she told them she was anxious to know the exact diagnosis,since her husband and son had both died of brain tumors. She saidthey would not give her any more information until the next timeand she would have to make another appointment for that. So she saidshe would not leave until the dcctor called her daughtet: She wouldn’tbudge. And when the doctor finally called her daughter, mc, who spokein perfect English—b and behold—we had assurances the CAT scanwould be found, promises that a conference call on Monday would beheld, and apologies for any suffering my mother had gone through fora most regrettable mistake.

I think my mother’s English almost had an effect on limiting my 15

possibilities in life as well. Sociologists and linguists probably willtell you that a person’s developing language skills are more influenced by peers. But I think that the language spoken in the family,cspcci thy in immigr tnt f imilics hich nc moi c insul ii ph ws t

large role in shaping the language of the child. And I believe that itaffected my results on achievement tests, 10 tests, and the SAT. Whilemy English skills were never judged as pooi; compared to math, English could not be considered my strong suit. In grade school I didmoderately well, getting perhaps B’s, sometimes B-pluses, in Englishand scoring perhaps in the sixtieth or seventieth percentile onachievement tests. But those scores were not good enough to override the opinion that my true abilities lay in math and science,because in those areas I achieved A’s and scored in the ninetieth percentile or higher.

This was understandable. Math is precise; there is only one correct t

answer. Whereas, kw me at least, the answers on English tests werealways a judgment call, a matter of opinion and personal experience.

fN / no ti< ;i I t’ I

those tests wi_re constructed iround items like ill iiii lie-hlaiiksentence completion, such as, “Even though fom was Mn

thought he was _.“ And the correct answer always seemed tobe the most bland combinations of thoughts, for example, Eventhough Tom was shy, Mary thought he was charming,” with thegrammatical structure “even though” limiting the correct answer tosome sort ol semantic opposites, so you wouldn’t get answers like,‘Even though Tom was foolish, Mary thought he was ridiculous.”Well, according to my mother, there were very few limitations as to

hat Tom could have been and what Mary might hae thought ofhim. So I never did \%ell on tests like that.

The same was tine with word analogies, pairs ol words in which von t7

were supposed to find some soi-t of logical, semantic relationship— forL\ noplc Snintt is to iiijit/aii is is to —— And hi_ti_ ouVOnld be presented with a list of four possible pairs, one of whichsli( wed the same kind of relationship: red is to stopulgllt. 11115 is toainval, c/n/is is to fei.’cg yawn is to boring. Well, I could never thinkthat way. I knew what the tests were asking, but I could not hlcck outof mx mind tht., tin igcs ih cadv crr ttcd by the lust p iii uinsel is tonig1iifill” —and I would see a burst of colors against a darkening sky,the moon rising, the lowering of a curtain of stars. And all the otherpairs of words -—--red, bus, stoplight, boring-—just threw tip a mass ofconfusing images, making it impossible for me to sort 0111 somethingIs lo.tc l is s i inc A sunsct pi ci_rdi_ s ne7htf ill is thi_ s irne as a

chill precedes a fevei” l’he only way I would have got ten that answeright would ha e been to imagine an associative situation, for ex

ample, my being disobedient and staving out past sunset, catching achill at [light, which turns into feverish pneumonia as punishment,vh ich indeed did happen to me.

I have been t [unki n about all iii is lately, about my mother’s is

English, about achievement tests. Because lately I’ve been asked, as awriter, why there are not more Asian Americans enrolled in creativewriting programs. Why do so many Chinese students go into cngineering? Well, these are broad sociological questions I can’t begin toanswer But I have noticed in surveys—in fact, just last week—thatAsian students, as a whole, always do significantly better on mathachievement tests than in English. And this makes me think thatthere are other Asian American students whose English spoken in thehome might also be described as broken” or “limited.” And perhapsthey also have teachers who are steering them away from writing andinto math and science, which is what happened to me.

262 DBFENON

Fortunately, I happen to be rebellious in nature and enjoy thechallenge of disproving assumptions made about inc. I became anEnglish major my first year in college, alter being enrolled as premed. I started writing nonfiction as a fredancer rite week afk’r I wastold by my fnrn,r boss that writing was my worst skill and I shouldhone my talents toward account nianagement.

But it wasn’t until 1985 that I finally began to write liction. And atfirst I wrote rising what I thought to be wittily crafted sentences, sentences that would finally prove 1 had mastery over the English language. Here an example from the first draft of a story that latermade its way into iiwJoi’ Luck (‘bib, but without this line: “That wasmy mental quandary in its nascent stale.” A terrible line, which I canbarely pronounce.

Fortunately, for reasons I won’t get into today, I later decided Ishould envision a reader for the stories I would write. And thereader I decided upon was my mother; because these were storiesabout mothers. So with this reader in mind—and in fact she didread my early drafts—I began to write stories using all the EngUshes I grew up wit Ii: the English I spoke to my inothet; which forlack of a better term might be described as “simple”: the Englishshe used with me, which for lack of a better term might bedescribed as “broken”; my translation of her Chinese, which couldcertainly be descrihed as “watered down”: and what I imagined tobe her translation of her Chinese if she could speak in peilect English, her internal language, and for that I sought to present theessence, bitt neither an English nor a Chinese structure. I wantedto capture what language ability tests can never reveal: her intent,her passion, her imagery, the rhythms of her speech, and thenature of her thoughts.

Aii1 riz)nl hat ans critic had to say about my wilting, I knew Ihad succeeded where it counted when my mother finished rendingmy book and gave me her verdict: “So easy to read.”

Meaning

I. For Tan the phrase “mother tongue” has a special meaning. I lowwould you summarize this meaning? Why does Tan feel so deeplyabout her “mother tongue”?

2. In what ways does the English that Tan’s mother speaks affect howpeople outside the Chinese American community think of her?What examples dues Tan give to demonstrate this Ilict of her mother’slife?

rAN/M0TItt:R 1ONGUE 263

3. In paragraph 15, Tan writes, “[M]y mothers English almost had aneffect on limiting roy possibdines in life as well,’ What does shemean? Why does she use the qualifier “almost?

Purpose and Audience

I Why do you suppose Tan wrote this essay? Does she have a purposebeyond changing readers’ perceptions of her mother’s “broken” Erogush? What passages support your answer?

2. how can you tell that Tan is not writing primarily to an audience ofAsian Americans? If Asian Americans were her primary audience,how might the essay he different?

Method and Structure

• flow does Tan develop her definition of her “mother tongue”? That is,how does she best help readers understand her mother’s speech?

2. Tan divides her essay into three sections, the second beginning inparagraph 8 and the third beginning in paragraph 18. What is thehcus of each section? Why do think Tan divided the essay like this?

3. Other Methods in paragraph 2 and again in paragraph 21, Tanrefers to “all the Englishes I grew up with.” How does she classify thesevarious “Englishes”?

Language

1 . What troubles Tan about the labels “broken, “ “fractured,” and “limited”for her mother’s English (paragraph 8)? Hmv do these labels contrastwith the way she views her mother’s speech?

2. In paragraphs 16 and 17, Tan writes about the kinds of vocabularyitems that appear on standardized English tests. In contrast to theprecision of the answers to mathematical questions, why were theanswers to vocabulary questions “always a judgment call, a matter ofopinion and personal experience” for her?

Writing Topics

Think about the language you speak with close friends or familymembers. What are some characteristics of this language that outsiders might lind diflicult to understand? Write an essay that focuseson the idea of “personal’ language—that is, language that creates orreflects closeness among people. In developing your essay, you maycall on your own experiences, your observations of others, and your

264 [)EFINtTION

readine (of both fiction and nonhit Ion) Be sure to pn)vde as nianvspecific examples 1 laneiiage use as on can,

2. [low do von define standard Enelish” h what extent do von believethat nonstandard Eiilish marks people as “limited’’? On hat oca51(11Th is standard Eitlish absoliitel iegnned? Aie there an’ occasions vher nonstandard English Is entit ek appropriate:’ In an essay,explain and illustrate both the drawhacks and the benefits of standardand nonstandard English. (Ii necessai’v, consult the Glossary underionstandard Eugli/i.)

3. Tan writes that as a student she didn’t do well on standardized English tests, In recent ears, such standardized testing has grown

increasingly prominent in evaluating students’ achievement, In anessay, discuss your ideas about standardized tests, flow accuratel dovon think they assess students’ academic abilities? I low do vonrespond to the claim that many such tests ai e biased in fasoi’ of aflluent white students! I low, in your experience, hiae they affected elassIc om teaching stiategies? \oil iail (oilsl(lel any of these lilestlons (Ii

other related ones that interest von.

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