“Mother 
                    Tongue”
                   Essay by Amy Tan
  Background
  Amy Tan became a writer even though her mother 
  wanted her to be a neurosurgeon and a concert pianist. 
  Her parents fled to the US due to China’s Communist 
  revolution, and she was born in Oakland, California.
  Her first novel was “The Joy Luck Club”. 
   Exposition / Beginning
   Main purpose: She explains and introduces the different kinds of english, that she 
   and her family speak.
   In detail: Tan is not a scholar, she is a writer and loves language. She always thinks of 
   language, it’s the tool for her trade. She talked different depending on the occasion. 
   In a speech she used english she never used at home with her mom. This shows that 
   the english she uses with her mom has intimacy. It’s the english she used at her home 
   for years.
   Rising action
   While some people may and have told Tan that her mother’s English is very unclear 
   and describe it as “broken”, she explains that she understands it perfectly, calling it 
   her “mother tongue”.
   She claims that “broken” English isn’t broken, defending her mother’s speech.