Blog Post #4 - Opinionated Blog Post

In the story “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, Amy feels strongly about the inequality shown towards her mother just because the level of her English is not the same as the native English speakers outside of her family. Throughout the story, Tan gives examples of how her mother is perceived differently out in public because of the way she expressed her thoughts imperfectly, for example Tan writes, “people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not her good service, pretend not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her.”

It’s one thing to be disrespected when you are out in public, but it’s different when your health is at risk and you are wrongly treated just because you can’t express yourself efficiently. Tan’s mother is a very smart woman who “reads the Forbes report, listens to Wall Street week, converses daily with her stockbroker, reads all the Shirley MacLaine’s books with ease.” These examples show that her “internal language” is far more advanced than the language she speaks out loud.

When you can’t understand someone who is talking to you shouldn’t automatically come to the conclusion that the person has been poorly educated. This happens to Tan’s mother, whilst she is at the hospital trying to get her CAT scan results. Just because Tan’s mother can’t express herself like a native English speaker it doesn’t mean she is dumb as her level of the English language is very good. This makes it very infuriating for her to talk to people out in public. Compared to her mother’s English, Tan has very good English although her grades in English did not match her true level. Tan’s English is very good verbally compared to her mother as she has been exposed to different forms of standard English which are used in school and in the books she reads. Tan and her husband do not use these forms of English at home with Tan’s as her verbal English is not very strong, and they would rather use the language of intimacy within the family community.

My opinion after reading this story is that people all around the world should respect everyone’s level of English, especially because of the community we are in here in the UAE, where the majority of the population living in the UAE are expatriates. There are 75 different nationalities, all with different levels of English, which forces people in the UAE to change their language depending on who they are communicating with. In the UAE, I find that many people judge someone’s English may not be to the level of a native speaker, which brings me to the point that people should take their time when talking to non-native English speakers, and they should take the time to try and understand someone’s internal language.