Chinese mothers as allies of patriarchy in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club

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Amira Benarioua

Abstract

In the present paper, I aim to investigate the concept of motherhood and its role in reinforcing male sexist stereotypes in the Chinese-American novel The Joy Luck Club (1989). The paper explores the controversial nature of motherhood and its implications on the psychological well-being of both the mother and daughter. Moreover, the paper displays the ambivalent role Chinese mothers play in the lives of their American born daughters and demonstrates the different factors and circumstances that affect the mothers’ behavior with their daughters. In China, the mother proves to be an oppressive force, an agent that along with the man works to enforce women’s inferiority and subordination.

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How to Cite
Benarioua, Amira. 2018. “Chinese Mothers As Allies of Patriarchy in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club”. AMERICANA E-Journal of American Studies in Hungary 14 (1). https://www.americanaejournal.hu/index.php/americanaejournal/article/view/45039.
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Essays
Author Biography

Amira Benarioua

Benarioua Amira is a PhD student in the doctoral program of English Literature and Culture at the Institute of English and American Studies, University of Szeged. She is the recipient of a Stipendium Hungaricum grant of the Ministry of National Human Resources. In her doctoral research, she focuses on the political, social and cultural status of women in third world countries and on how patriarchy and sexism influence women’s lives and future. Her research interests include postmodernism, feminism, cultural studies, gender studies, sociology, and psychology. She also investigates the theme of female body, sexuality, and violence in minority women’s fiction by exploring different US minority cultures, including African and Caribbean. Email: benarioua.amira@gmail.com