Fifth Chinese Daughter

Wong's story highlights the problem which young Chinese female immigrants face as they come to the cultural crossroads of the old and the new. There is something in Wong which leads her to choose an uncertain life as an independent young woman making her way through Western culture over a life of security in the patriarchal shadow of the traditional Chinese culture. We do not clearly see what that "something" is, aside from some work outside the home and attendance at a junior college. It may simply be that her choice for independence was an inevitable result of her exposure to Western culture, but certainly many other young Chinese daughters in the United States are similarly exposed but never make such a sudden and dramatic break from their parents.

Up to the time that she makes her decision to disobey her father and mother, she appears to have been

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om the play: Jake: That's not my point! Louise: It's my point! Jake: It's hopeless! Louise: Then get a divorce! (Tannen 457) Here we see no evidence that these people are doing anything to truly communicate with one another, but instead are simply and blatantly trying to control the conversation and dominate the other person. On the surface, Jake's statements are borne of frustration with Louise's failure to understand what he is trying to say to her, but in reality he is simply trying to control the nature and direction of the exchange. By saying "That's not the point!", he is trying to intimidate Louise into dropping her own position and adopting his. By saying "It's hopeless!", he is actually trying to control her through insult, insinuating that she is hopeless as a mature conversationalist. Similarly, on the surface, Louise's statements are borne of trying to get him to understand her preoccupation with metamessages, but in reality she is trying to control him and the conversation and frustrate his attempts to control her. When she says "Then get a divorce," she knows he does not want a divorce, but she is trying to belittle his concern with respect to their daughter. She knows her talk of divorce drives him u
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 4129
Approximate Pages = 17 (250 words per page)

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