"Two Kinds" is one of several vignettes in The Joy Luck Club that is told by a daughter of Chinese immigrants. In this story, it's Jing-Mei Woo who is relating a story from her childhood and the ways her perspective as a Chinese American child diverges from her mother's. Early in the story, Jing-Mei recalls that her mother said America was a place of hope; Suyuan had a tragic past in China and looks to America as a place where "things [would] get better."
As a result of Suyuan's attitude, Jing-Mei is expected to excel and become a "prodigy." Jing-Mei recalls how her mother tried to make her "a Chinese Shirley Temple" and then a master pianist. However, she finds that she has no real aptitude or interest in the areas her mother chooses for her. The fact that the daughter grows up as an American and has not experienced the tragedies that her mother faced in China means she is not as stringent about her own success. Her mother is, in some ways, trying to replace her the two daughters she lost in China when she had to flee her village; Jing-Mei feels exceptional pressure that she must fulfill the hopes of three daughters and not just one. The mother and daughter's respective attitudes are determined by the country/culture in which they are born.
The setting of the story "Two Kinds" is in San Francisco in the 1950s. The mother in the story arrived from China in 1949 after having lost everything there, including her husband and twin baby girls. She arrives in the United States hoping to start anew and to recoup what she has lost, and she believes firmly in the American Dream—that achieving anything in her new country is possible.
The setting is important in this story because it provides insight into why the narrator's mother wants her daughter, June, to be so successful in the United States. The mother is filled with the dreams of an Asian immigrant who has lost everything in her home country. In addition, the daughter is a first-generation American who feels torn between the ways of her mother and the ways of her new country. The narrator is more typically American than her mother, in that she just wants to be herself. The story describes the struggle of an Asian immigrant mother and her American-born daughter to understand each other and depicts the ways in which their hopes and dreams differ.
The setting of a story typically concerns itself with time and place. In "Two Kinds," the story takes place in the United States during the 1960's, in San Francisco's Chinatown.
Jing-mei's mother, Suyuan, is a Chinese immigrant, so it makes sense that she and her family live in Chinatown. That part of the city will be reminiscent of her home country. Additionally, she will be able to get by without needing to speak a lot of English. Being placed in the 1960's also means that the stereotypical "American Dream" is alive and well and at the forefront of the minds of many immigrants. Suyuan might have a job cleaning other people's houses; however, she sees indications all around her that Jing-mei could do anything and become rich and famous because of it.
My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America. You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get good retirement. You could buy a house with almost no money down. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous.
This belief in a rags to riches possibility is what motivates Suyuan to begin pushing Jing-mei to become a child prodigy of some kind. The text walks readers through Suyuan's multiple tries to get Jing-mei good at something. She eventually tries to have Jing-mei be a piano prodigy like the girl on the Ed Sullivan Show.
Three days after watching the Ed Sullivan Show my mother told me what my schedule would be for piano lessons and piano practice.
The setting directly influences Suyuan's beliefs and actions. She believes that anything is possible in America because that is what she sees on TV and hears from other people in Chinatown. The rags to riches belief is common among many immigrants at this time. Suyuan believes that it is possible for Jing-mei to be taught to be a piano prodigy. What's worse is that Suyuan is pushing her own American dream onto Jing-mei. Suyuan doesn't understand that the American dream isn't guaranteed to come true, especially when Jing-mei wants nothing to do with that particular dream.
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