Amanda Jordan
Eng 122:1-7 Writing Prompt Assignment
9/2/21
1. I selected “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan
2. I believe the author's purpose was to explain how we all may speak the same languages
but a lot of people speak it different ways. With close family members, they speak it
differently than they would if they were talking formally to someone else. I came to
arrive at this decision when Amy was talking about how she talked with her mother and
husband, versus how she talked with everyone else. She talked in “broken” English with
her mother and husband. With everyone else, she talked in our so called “normal”
English.
3. One key point was how she explained how she talked with her mother and husband.
Another key point was how she talked with everyone else more formally. The third key
point is how she decided to write stories using all the Englishes she grew up with. Please
keep point Support it because she wanted to explain how we would talk with our
immediate family versus how we talked with everyone else.
4. I believe that the author is writing to everyone who may be Asian-American or anybody
else that is bilingual. One challenge this author faces is the bullies that she may face, the
naysayers. Any outsider could possibly start making fun of Amy in the way she and her
mother talked with each other, simply because they had grown up with that and they were
close minded if you will. Anything she thought was normal with her mother speech, other
people might find odd. Often in this world, people that are different in any way, shape, or
form, they get made fun of, or ridiculed because they are not living up to the societal
Eng 122:1-7 Writing Prompt Assignment
9/2/21
1. I selected “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan
2. I believe the author's purpose was to explain how we all may speak the same languages
but a lot of people speak it different ways. With close family members, they speak it
differently than they would if they were talking formally to someone else. I came to
arrive at this decision when Amy was talking about how she talked with her mother and
husband, versus how she talked with everyone else. She talked in “broken” English with
her mother and husband. With everyone else, she talked in our so called “normal”
English.
3. One key point was how she explained how she talked with her mother and husband.
Another key point was how she talked with everyone else more formally. The third key
point is how she decided to write stories using all the Englishes she grew up with. Please
keep point Support it because she wanted to explain how we would talk with our
immediate family versus how we talked with everyone else.
4. I believe that the author is writing to everyone who may be Asian-American or anybody
else that is bilingual. One challenge this author faces is the bullies that she may face, the
naysayers. Any outsider could possibly start making fun of Amy in the way she and her
mother talked with each other, simply because they had grown up with that and they were
close minded if you will. Anything she thought was normal with her mother speech, other
people might find odd. Often in this world, people that are different in any way, shape, or
form, they get made fun of, or ridiculed because they are not living up to the societal
