Amy Tan's short story "Two Kinds" allows the reader to understand two kinds of conflict: internal and external. Jing-mei's mother believes Jing-mei can be anything she wants to be in America. Jing-mei has self doubt. Can she live up to her mother's expectations? Does she want to? There are conflicts within themselves and with each other.
One conflict occurs when Jing-mei looks in the mirror. All day, her mother had been giving her tests that were frustrating because they contained material Jing-mei hadn't learned. Her mother was pressuring her to succeed in life. She was preoccupied with the thought that her daughter could be as smart as, or even smarter than the children the mother had seen on television. Jing-mei starts getting mad at herself for not being a genius, which creates an internal conflict. In her mind, Jing-mei said: "And after seeing my mother's disappointed face once again, something inside of me began to die" ("Two Kinds," Page 47). Before bed that......
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Approximate Word Count: 681
Approximate Pages: 3 (260 words per double-spaced page) |