The story “Who’s Irish” by Gish Jen is a short story about an elderly Chinese grandmother living with her daughters family in America, trying to help raise their child Sophia. She struggles watching Sophie grow up in a culture so distant from the way she raised her daughter, and even further from how she was raised herself. She does not fit into the western culture, and seems to find flaws and lack of moral everywhere, especially in her daughter’s husband John, who is between jobs and seem to suffer from depression, an illness she does not recognize.
The mother and grandmother drift further away from each other as a result of the grandmother trying to teach Sophie discipline and respect the way she was taught it. Eventually the daughter decides that they would be better off without the help of her mother. The grandmother moves in at a friend’s house, and seem to be getting along pretty well, even though she still seems to be complaining over American culture Characterization: The narrator is an elderly Chinese mother, and grandmother. You could somewhat determine her as a round character as she develops throughout the story.
The narrator lives with her daughter Natalie, her husband John and their child Sophie. The narrator does not seem to be fond of the way her daughter and husband are raising their child Sophie, and as a cause of that she is wild and uncontrollable. The narrator seems to know that western culture and the way of raising children is far from what she was taught in China, but does not seem to want to accept this, and as a result becomes unpopular in the family. The narrator spends a lot of time advertising herself as a fierce, hardworking and determent woman.
The Essay on Ibo Culture Children Women Wives
The Role of Women in the Ibo Culture The culture in which ''Things Fall Apart'' is centered around is one where patriarchal testosterone is supreme and oppresses all females into a nothingness. They are to be seen and not heard, farming, caring for animals, raising children, carrying foo-foo, pots of water, and kola. The role of women in the Ibo culture was mostly domestic. The men saw them as ...
She feels a need to make this pretty clear, and seems proud of it, which reflects in her way of raising Sophia, who in her mind is a clever girl who just needs to be taught a little Chinese discipline. She seems as an intellectual individual, trying to do what she thinks is best for her granddaughter Sophia, such as spanking her. Although she is obviously too naive to think that her daughter, and husband would not find out. It all ends when she is supposed to pick up Sophia from kinder garden, and Sophia disrespects her by not following her orders.
In an attempt of reversed psychology the grandmother leaves the kinder garden, only to return later as it was getting dark outside. The grandmother actually panics and we side a different side of her, a scared caring grandmother. In an attempt to lure out the child she pokes a stick under the climbing frame where the child was hiding. The parents soon come by the kinder garden to find Sophia asleep underneath the climbing frame, bruised and battered by the poking. As a result the grandmother is told to live elsewhere. She hooks up with a friend, and adapts pretty well at her house, living as an American.
