Joy Luck Club freewrite

The Joy Luck Club is a tale of four women immigrants from China and their daughters. They each have a unique, interesting story of their cultural backgrounds and how they adjust to the United States. As the story goes on, their four stories blend together and the reader is exposed to a deep insight into China’s long, traditional history and the hardship of adjusting to the modern America.


Much of the culture revolves around women being inferior. They believe that every woman should be a good wife, taking care of her husband’s every need. Women cannot express any opinions or wants they have. This would be considered selfish. All the mothers of the Joy Luck Club were raised on that kind of thought. They still follow it now that they have come to California. The daughters, however, have been exposed to a more modern world where women actually have a say in things and are almost completely equal with men. They have a hard time convincing their moms that this new way is acceptable as well as the traditional way of thinking.

Divorce is generally not an option to the mothers of this story. Most of the daughters are having marital problems and really have nowhere to turn but divorce. As each of the daughters tells her mom, accusations come out as to why the marriage has failed. Most of these ideas occur in the daughters’ heads. They remember little superstitions their mothers had told them as little girls. For example, every grain of rice you don’t eat will make a pockmark on your husband. The more pockmarks a man has, the worse of a man he is. At first glance, this is a way to get kids to finish eating. However, as her marriage is falling apart, one of the daughters remembers this, and how she reacted when her mom first told her. She starts to blame all her problems on this theory.