The author uses several rhetorical tragedies to make Tan’s argument strong and easily to understand the hidden messages that their examples bring. In the beginning of the story, Amy starts with an argument which likely to be controversial about cultural prejudice without showing any problem or specifically pointing out racism. Amy illustrates very well with numerous facts how can affect the discrimination to people who do not speak English very well: “People in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good services, pretended not to understand her” (Tan. 68) This is a proof and veracity of how others look her mother’s issue. She is using her mother as an inspiration to describe the limitation with English and the disadvantage which her mother presents to society. The disrespectful for not speak properly English tends to be one of the main problem that she wants to explain in the entire essay. In addition the fact that this story was written by an immigrant makes Tan’s argument stronger and reliTABLE with her mother struggling in America.
Using a sarcastic tone, she introduces another example of her ethos style when she talks about her mothers tumor: “The capital did not apologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan… She said they would not give her any more information until next time… So she said she would not leave until the doctor called her daughter … And when the doctor finally called her daughter, me, who spoke in perfect English– 10 and behold –we had assurances the CAT scan would be found… (Tan 2) This example represents how Americans assume that information from people who do not speak a fluently English is of less important or incorrect that people who do. The reader may notice the limitations Amoy’s mother is exposed for not speaking proper English. Even in the hospital where the doctors supposed to help her, they also have the prejudice with the language which not allowed them to offer a decent service nor apologize for the inconvenience that they made for missing her CAT exams. As a consequence, Mays mother could not do anything more than waiting for her daughter to resolve the problem with her fluently English.
Amy wants to show her audience with this bitter experience that she expects that one day her mother could be treated equal as an American without any prejudice about her English. While Tan explains her mother struggles with the language, she shows to the readers the connection which she has when her mother cannot explain herself in front to her and how her mother’s “broken” English affected in her entire life: “l was ashamed of her English. Believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say. That is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect. It is obvious to see the word “ashamed” which she uses several times in her essay as the best way to explain her feeling when she grew up with a mother who cannot speak a leniently English. As a result, she uses the role of emotion to intrigue the reader by using her personal experience to show that maybe not only her, but other immigrant families might have the same issue with the language. Based on that, Tam tends to use ethical appeal as one of the rhetorical devices which she uses in her essay to be TABLE to make her characters with more credibility and consisting with her details. Why he don’t send me check, already two weeks late. So mad he lie to me, losing me money. Amy states that she would be very embarrassed when in this situations because he would be speaking proper English, unlike her mom. She would say the same thing but in proper English like ‘Yes, am getting rather concerned. You had agreed to send the check two weeks ago, but it hasn’t arrived. ‘” In her argument, she emphasizes the reason what she had to help out her mother in order to resolve the problem, but using her correct English to show the power of the language.
Amy implements emotional appeal to represent with more interesting and curious details, instead of use only straight facts. Situation like that, tend to prevalent in Aryans life that always had to help her or not having the necessary arguments to talks and confronts problems herself. Therefore, Amy uses this embarrassing experience of her life as a essential part of her argument that language is one of the most important tools that people like Amoy’s mother need to survive in America.
In addition, not everything is about Aryans mother in the story; she also makes reference about her effort and struggle that she had to do when she began to study English. Considering that Amoy’s first language was different that English, studying English was a enormous challenge for her, and even more she comes a prodigious writer when most foreign studies tend to seek other majors than English: “In grade school I did moderately well, getting perhaps Bi’s, sometimes a-pluses, in English and scoring perhaps in the sixtieth or seventieth percentile on achievement 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 Ass and scored in the ninetieth percentile or higher”. (Tan 3) Amy use inductive reasoning as another rhetorical strategies to represent the idea which she had about studying master English might be impossible with all of the prejudice that non-native English speaker has with the language.
She uses a slightly egocentric tone to tell how successful student she is in science and math compared to the difficulties that she has in literary English test which tend to be more complex to analyze. In other words, she draws this situation in order to reach the conclusion that in the beginning was very hard to study English just for the fact that English was not her first language, but in the end her effort and dedication were the key to success and became a great writer.
In general, Amy Tan’s story makes solid reasons to show embarrassing tuitions that people who do not speak English very well agonize living in America, and even more shows the suffering that she as a daughter of a mother with “Broken” English has to tolerate for to get ahead. In the end, Amy Tan successfully uses these different rhetorical strategies and literary devices to persuade the reader to see inside of them that anybody has the power to judge or criticize the language or thoughts of a person, and there is not a valid reason for not respecting an immigrant who is learning English in America.
Indeed, Amy uses a consistent tone, and excellent word choice to be blew to express the right message to the native English speaker without losing the respect and interest of them. Uses a very good choice of words, resulting in his history of the right message to people who speak English without losing the respect and interest of them There was a good variety of sentence fluency, there was logical tone, and superior word choice was present.
Army is successful in conveying the difficulty of life how her mother have to struggle with as well as her. Otherwise, Amy Tan perceive the power of English as using in variety way of different people. According to the novel, its purpose is to wake-up who have a ring vision about immigrant who do not speak proper English, not to judge or bring them down but let’s together help them out.
