There Are All These New Books Out There Portraying Asian Mothers as Scheming

8/2/2019 There Are All These New Books Out There Portraying Asian Mothers as Scheming

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There are all these new books out there portraying Asian mothers as scheming, callous,

overdriven people indifferent to their kids true interests, Amy Chua writes. She ought to

know, because hers is the big one: Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, a diabolically well-

packaged, highly readable screed ostensibly about the art of obsessive parenting. In truth, Ms.

Chuas memoir is about one little narcissists book-length search for happiness. And for all

its quotable outbursts from Mama Grisly (the nickname was inevitable), it will gratify thesame people who made a hit out of the granola-heartedEat, Pray, Love.

Peter Z. Mahakian

Amy Chua

BATTLE HYMN OF THE TIGER MOTHER

By Amy Chua

You might wonder how this is possible. In Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert presented

herself as a seeker of solace, whereas Ms. Chua eagerly overacts the role of wicked witch.

The litany of her outrages has made her aninstant conversation piece.What kind of mother

throws her 3-year-old out in the cold? (You cant stay in the house if you dont listen to

Mommy.) Or complains that her familys pet rabbits arent smart enough? (They were

unintelligent and not at all what they claimed to be.) Or, most memorably, makes her two

daughters music lessons so grueling that one girl leaves tooth marks on the piano?

Ms. Chua claims that this is the essence of tough Chinese parenting, as opposed to the lax

Western kind. And already her book has a talking point: What does she mean by Chinese and

Western? She is of Chinese descent, but she grew up in the American Midwest. (How I

wished I could have a bologna sandwich like everyone else!) She became a law professor

and now teaches at Yale. She and her husband, another Yale law professor, hired a Chinese

nanny to speak Mandarin, though Ms. Chua doesnt speak it herself. Ms. Chua grew up as a

Roman Catholic, but her daughters were raised as Jews.

So she admits to using the term Chinese mother loosely so loosely that even a

supersuccessful white guy from South Dakota (youve seen him on television) told her his
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working-class father was a Chinese mom. (The book carries an it will leave you breathless

blurb from South Dakotas own Tom Brokaw.) And what she uses Chinese mother to mean

is this: driven, snobbish and hellbent on raising certifiably Grade A children. Ms. Chua

contrasts these attitudes with the sappy Western ones that can be found in Disney movies,

where a mere romp in the ocean can be construed as a happy ending.

Thats just Disneys way of appealing to all the people who never win any prizes, she says.

Ms. Chua was not about to raise prizeless slackers. She wanted prodigies, even if it meant

nonstop, punishing labor. So Battle Hymn ofthe Tiger Mother chronicles its authors

constant demanding, wheedling, scolding and screaming. It describes seemingly endless

piano and violin sessions that Ms. Chua supervised. (Her own schedule of teaching, traveling,

writing and dealing with her students goes mostly unmentionedand would require her to

put in a 50-hour workday.) And it enforces a single guiding principle that is more reasonable

than all the yelling suggests: What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until

youre good at it.

If this were the entirety of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, this book would not be

destined for major best sellerdom. But Ms. Chuas story has been shaped according to a

familiar narrative arc, the one that ensures that her comeuppance will occur, that her children

will prove wiser than she and that other not-all-that-far-from-Disney things will happen.

When its time to fess up to shortcomings (the truth is Im not good at enjoying life) and

smell the roses at the end of the book, Ms. Chua deploys her sisters illness to provide the

necessary dose of carpe diem.

Wherever she is in this slickly well-shaped story, Ms. Chua never fails to make herself itscenter of attention. When her older daughter, Sophia, was a baby, she basically slept, ate and

watched me have writers blockuntil she was a year old. (The italics here are mine.)

Sophia, she later explains, youre just like I was in my family. When she pitches whats

already become her most notorious fit over the girls amateurishly made birthday cards, Ms.

Chua declares, I spend half my salary on stupid sticker and eraser party favors for their

birthdays, adding I deserve better than this. And when Jed fails to honor Ms. Chuas

birthday with reservations at a good enough restaurant, and the family ends up at a so-so one,

he too is in hot water.

Jed? Yes, Jed. Ms. Chuas husband plays a large role in this story, even if he is made to

sound like her hapless foil. He is presented as a handsome, charming and amazingly patient

man, especially since his mother and wife had some similar traits. (His mother, according tothe book, was once aghast at the cheeses Ms. Chua chose for a party and demanded better

ones.) Jed is the fixture without which Ms. Chuas book would not be possible. And h e is

often wrong, wrong, wrong about child rearing, which means that the reader will think he is

right.

Jed happens to be Jed Rubenfeld, a novelist as well as a lawyer. His first book, a richly

textured historical thriller,The Interpretation of Murder,was published in 2006. When Ms.

Chua runs up expenses for extra music lessons in Tiger Mother, Jed is quoted as saying,Id better start on a sequel now.

That sequel, The Death Instinct, is about to come out. It lacks the sensationalism to rise ashigh on the charts as Ms. Chuas book, but its a well-executed work of escapism and an
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emphatically good read. Set in the post-World War I era, it has a notably smart, well-

educated heroine and features Sigmund Freud as a character. For reasons about which Tiger

Mother readers can speculate, Mr. Rubenfeld sends Freud delving into the causes of shell

shock.

Great Thinkers: Charles Darwin and Evolution

STEVE EMBER: Welcome to Explorations, in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

This week, Barbara Klein and I tell about one of the most influential thinkers in science

history.

Charles Darwin developed the theory of how living things develop from simpler organisms

over long periods of time. That theory is known as evolution through natural selection.

(MUSIC)

How do new kinds of life come into existence? For much of recorded history, people have

believed that organisms were created. Few people believed that living things changed. What

process could make such change possible?

These were some of the questions Charles Darwin asked himself over years of research in

botany, zoology and geology. He was not the first person to ask them. His own grandfather,Erasmus Darwin, believed that species evolved. And others, like the French naturalist Jean-

Baptiste Lamark, had proposed ways this could happen. But it was Darwin who identified

and explained the process, natural selection, that causes life to evolve.

BARBARA KLEIN: Charles Darwin was born in Shrewsbury, England on February twelfth,

eighteen-oh-nine. His father Robert Darwin was a doctor. Charles' mother Susannah Darwin

was the daughter of the famous potter, Josiah Wedgwood. She died when Charles was only

eight years old.

Young Charles was intensely interested in the natural world from an early age. But his fatherwanted him to be a doctor.

At age sixteen, Charles was sent to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh. But he

did not like it. He found medical operations especially horrible. He later went to Cambridge

University. His father now hoped that Darwin would become a clergyman. But at

Cambridge, Charles continued to follow his own interests. There, he met John Henslow, a

plant scientist and clergyman. The two became friends.

STEVE EMBER: John Henslow suggested that Charles Darwin take the unpaid position of

naturalist for a trip on the British ship H.M.S. Beagle. It sailed around the world from

eighteen thirty-one to eighteen thirty-six. The main goal was to make maps of the coastline of


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South America. The British government paid for the voyage. But another purpose of the trip

was to collect scientific objects from around the world.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: The Beagles first stop was one of the Cape Verde Islands near thecoast of Africa. There, Darwin noted that levels of rock extending high above the sea

contained the fossil remains of shells. He thought that this was evidence that the bottom of

the ocean had been lifted up by powerful geological forces over long periods of time.

The Beagle continued to the coast of South America. In Valdivia, Chile, Darwin experienced

an earthquake. He collected examples of plants and animals. He also collected the fossil

remains of animals that had disappeared from the Earth.

But it was on the Galapagos Islands off the coast of Ecuador that Darwin found creatures that

made him wonder about how species develop and change. There, he saw giant tortoises and

noted that the reptiles were different on each island.

He collected birds, each with different beaks. Later, after he had returned to England, he

would be shocked to find that these very different birds were all finches. Darwin found

lizards called iguanas that lived on land and ones that fed in the sea.

Darwin noted that all these species were similar to those found in South America. But, they

all had differences, or adaptations, that helped them survive in the environment of the

Galapagos Islands.

STEVE EMBER: Darwin sent much of what he collected back to England on other ships the

Beagle met along the way. By the time he returned to England in October of eighteen thirty-

six, he was already a well known geologist and naturalist. Within a few years, he would be

accepted into scientific organizations like the Geological Society and the Royal Society.

Darwin moved to London to be near other scientists. He wrote a new version of the book

about his travels. He also edited works of others about the things he had collected on his

trip. Darwin also agreed to write several books including the "Zoology of the Voyage of the

H.M.S. Beagle." But in eighteen thirty-seven, the pressure of the work caused his health to

suffer. He developed problems with his heart.

BARBARA KLEIN: Charles Darwin had poor health much of his life. He sufferedheadaches and problems with his skin and stomach. No one was able to find out what disease

he may have had during his lifetime. Recently, some experts have suggested that he might

have become infected with a tropical disease. Others suggest Darwins health problems were

caused by conflict in his mind over his theory. Poor health would later force him to leave

London and settled at Down House near Kent, England.

Darwin began work on a series of secret notebooks containing his thoughts about the

evolutionary process. He began to think that animals developed from earlier, simpler

organisms. As early as eighteen thirty-seven, he imagined this process as a tree with

branches representing new species. Unsuccessful branches ended. But successful

evolutionary changes continued to form new branches.


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STEVE EMBER: Charles Darwins personal life was also expanding. In eighteen thirty-

nine, he married Emma Wedgwood, his cousin. He told her his ideas about how species

evolve over time -- what he called the transmutation of species.

Emma did not agree with her husband. But the two had a strong and happy marriage. They

had ten children together. Seven of them survived.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Charles Darwin read widely and sought ideas from other fields of

study. He was influenced by Thomas Malthus work, "An Essay on the Principle of

Population" written in seventeen ninety-eight. Malthus argued that populations are always

limited by the food supply.

Darwin would later say that this work caused him to realize the struggle for limited resources

was a fact of life. He said small changes took place in individual animals. Changes that

helped them survive would continue. But those that did not would be destroyed. The result ofthis would be the formation of new species.

The British philosopher Herbert Spencer described this struggle as "survival of the fittest."

But biologists use the term natural selection to describe the evolutionary process.

STEVE EMBER: Charles Darwin developed his idea slowly over more than twenty years.

He was concerned that he would lose the support of the scientific community if he revealed

it. He wrote to his friend, botanist Joseph Hooker, that speaking about evolution was like

confessing a murder.

It was not until eighteen fifty-eight that Darwin was forced to release his theory to the public.

Another naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, had independently written a paper that contained

ideas similar to Darwin's concerning evolution. Wallace had reached these ideas from his

studies on islands in the western Pacific Ocean.

With help from Darwin's friends, the two naturalists presented a joint scientific paper to the

Linnean Society of London in July of eighteen fifty-eight. At first there was little reaction.

Then, in November, eighteen fifty-nine, Darwin released the results of all his work on

evolution. The book was called "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or

the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life." It was an immediate success.

BARBARA KLEIN: The "Origin of Species" was praised by many scientists. But religious

leaders denounced it. For them, evolution opposed the explanation of creation found in the

book of Genesis in the Bible. Today, almost all scientists accept the theory of evolution. But

many non-scientists are unsure about whether humans evolved over millions of years. In the

United States, public opinion studies have shown that less than half the population believes in

evolution.

STEVE EMBER: Natural selection does not explain everything about why species evolve.

Darwin did not know about Gregor Mendels work on heredity. And the discovery of

genetics and D.N.A. molecules took place long after his death. Yet, Darwin theorized in a


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world much different from the one we know. That is why scientists today wonder at the

depth of his knowledge and the strength of his arguments.

Charles Darwin died on April nineteenth, eighteen eighty-two. He was buried at Westminster

Abbey, in London, among other heroes of Britain.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: This program was written and produced by Mario Ritter. Im Barbara

Klein.

STEVE EMBER: And Im Steve Ember. You can find a link to Charles Darwin's writings

and research at our Web site, voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for

Explorations in VOA Special English.

Chinese moms in China arent raising superior kids, actually. U.S. author Amy Chuas bookBattle

Hymn of the Tiger Motherand The Wall Street Journalextract of her memoir headlined Why

Chinese Mothers Are Superiorhas sparked huge debate inside China. But the response from whatshould surely be the Wild Kingdom of tiger moms might surprise you.

One real Chinese mom is 39-year-old Guo Jing, a government office-worker in Beijing with twin 8-

year-old sons. (Yale law professor Amy Chua is of Filipino-Chinese descent and lives in the U.S., not in

China.) I wont be like Amy Chua, says Guo about her kids' upbringing. I dont want to pressure

them ... in the future Id like them to have their own hobbies, to develop their own abilities. I wont

make decisions for them. Guo says she believes her sons love their extracurricular hobbiessuch as

painting and learning how to play weiqi(the Chinese equivalent of chess, also known as go)not

because she forces them into it, but precisely because she does not: I didnt give them any

pressure. If that isnt a startling admission, heres the clincher: Guo is so convinced that her kids

need more than a traditional Chinese education that shes sending them to a private, bilingual

international school where kids learn both English and Chinese in a comparatively looser classroom

environment. I try my best to adopt both Chinese and Western educational ways.

Chuas maternal attitudes and strict parenting guidelinesthe long hours of piano practice, the

many thou shalt nots, the homework that never goes unfinishedare familiar fare to many

mainland Chinese families. One recent online survey in China, conducted in response to the

controversy over Chuas book, found a majority of Chinese netizens ticking the box that stated Yes,

starting from when I was little, my mother always said Im not as good as others at this or that.
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Then theres the eye-opening international study, conducted in 65 countries and publicized last

month, revealing that Shanghai schoolkids outperformed all other contenders in reading, science,

and math. Of the next three top performersstudents in Hong Kong, Singapore, and South Korea

two are ethnic Chinese societies and the third is based on Confucian beliefs, prompting The New

York TimessNicholas Kristofto declare Confucianism the hands-down winner. Education thrives in

China and the rest of Asia because it is a top priorityand weve plenty to learn from that,

concludes Kristof, who compares Chinas educational challenge to the U.S. to a 21st-century

Sputnik moment. American schoolchildren scored No. 15 in reading, No. 23 in science, and No. 31 in

math.

But the really big questionand one that the Chinese mom debate doesnt entirely exploreis

this: Even if Chinese moms raise kids who excel academically, does that mean the aggregate of

those scholastically superior kids is a more dynamic economy, a more creative population, a

superior society? And the answer is no, at least as far as Chinese moms, and the Chinese kids they

raise, inside China are concerned.

In fact, Chinas suffering a glut of college grads who cant find appropriate jobs, and a shortage of

blue-collar workers. These jobless grads comprise an unusual underclassthey're educated, white-

collar, net-savvy yet brokenicknamed ants due to their tendency to live in cheap, ramshackle

slumlike urban dorms while searching for work. Chinas chaotic higher-education system is churning

out too many university graduates with high-paying expectations and too few practical skills.

Multinational managers privately complain that fresh Chinese grads are often clueless when it

comes to working in an office environment. (One Western expat who helps Chinese students enter

Western colleges tells the story of a Chinese student who lived with an English host family in Britain;

he was so flummoxed by his inability to work the family's washing machine that he phoned his mom

back in China for help. The Chinese mom phoned the washing-machine manufacturer's rep in China

who then contacted the firm's people in the U.K. to help out the hapless son.) Tellingly, last year saw

a decrease in the numbers of high-school students taking the nationwide college entrance

examinations, the all-important rite of passage by which college freshmen are selected. By contrast,

applications to blue-collar vocational schools jumped.

Chinese complain that the quality of mainland higher educationespecially teachinghas generally

deteriorated compared to a decade or two ago. "We miss the good teachers we had [in our youth],"

says 40-something Cao Dongming, who works with her husband Sun Yongwei in Beijing. "We really

dont know what will happen to our kids generation. Their daughter lives and attends high school

in their hometown in northeast China, residing with Caos mother. Cao's lament is a common one

among Chinese moms in China: "Our daughter has a lot of pressure to study. No breaks, or only a

half-day break on Sundays. The biggest pressure is the overload of homework she even has to do

homework during lunch break. We think its ridiculous for teenagers ... Too much homework will

drain them. That's why we've sometimes told her to ignore the homework and just go to sleep.

What the "Chinese mom" debate swirling around Amy Chua's book fails to adequately consider is

the fact that American classroomsand society in generalare more conducive to individual

expression and innovation. The rote learning that she stresses might work when her daughters,outside the home, are encouraged to think independently. But in China, where authoritarian
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parenting is coupled with an ossified higher education system, creativity is stifled. The father-knows-

best Confucian approach is applied to a repressive degree. (Indeed, Chinese men dominate

academia, and the "Chinese dad" phenomenon would be considered more relevant than that of the

"Chinese mom" to begin with.)

Many young Chinese lament there is no Bill Gates of China. Professors are embarrassed that no

Chinese living on the mainland are Nobel laureatesexcept for dissident Liu Xiaobo, last year's

Peace Prize winner, who happens to be in jail. And the most cutting-edge scientific institutions are

research centers run by Western-educated administrators wooing Chinese-born scientists back from

the West, where they had relocated in order to enjoy the more rewarding research environment

abroad. If they had the money and the clout and the personal connections to do so, Chinese moms

would want to send their kids to Harvard (as several top-level Chinese leaders have done). In other

words, the key to success is seen as a hybrid of East and Westat least when viewed from the lair of

the Tiger Moms.

Professor: Morning everyone. Now, in todays talk, Im going to talk about tunnels, and Im going to

talk about the main ways in which tunnels are constructed. Now, Im sure you know what a tunnel is,

but Ill give you a definition anyway. Its an underground passageway, and its completely enclosed,

except for exits, usually one at each end. Before you can start building any tunnel, its necessary to

perform a comprehensive geotechnical investigation of ground conditions. This is done by takingsamples from boreholes; that means drilling a narrow shaft into the ground and analysing the rock.

After this has been done, engineers can choose the most appropriate method for excavating the

tunnel and supporting the ground. If these samples dont reveal enough information maybe its

difficult to detect the exact location of faults for example, then a pilot tunnel will be drilled. Pilot

tunnels have a smaller diameter than the main tunnel, and so it will be easier to support, should any

problems arise. This smaller tunnel can be incorporated into the final tunnel later on. Another

alternative is to drill horizontal boreholes ahead of the advancing tunnel face. Now, are there any

questions before I go on to construction methods? No? Good. So, the type of construction you

choose will depend on a wide range of things: the type of rock, the ground water conditions, how

long and how wide your tunnel is going to be, how far underground it is and the final use of the

tunnel. There are three main types of tunnel. The cut and cover technique; this is when a trench is

dug up and then covered over; the bored tunnel, which is constructed without removing the ground

above it, and the immersed tube tunnel, which is used underwater. Lets look at these in more

detail, starting with the cut and cover method. As I said, this is done by digging a trench and roofing

it with an overhead support system strong enough to carry whatever is to built over the tunnel.

There are two types of cut and cover method. In the bottom-up method, a trench is built, with

ground support as necessary, and the tunnel is constructed in the trench, using concrete or arches,

or even brickwork. Then the trench is filled in again. But theres another method the top-down

method, in which the roof beams and the side walls are put into place before any of the ground is

dug out. Only when the roof and the walls are in place does excavation take place. The advantage


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of this system is that it allows minimal disturbance to surface features such as roads and buildings.

The cut and cover tunnel type is obviously better for tunnels which are quite shallow. London

underground stations are good examples. Not the tunnels themselves, but the area where the ticket

halls are located. The underground tunnels were created using the boring method. Bored tunnels

are preferable in most cases, because they eliminate the need to buy up the land on the surface. As

a result, its quicker, and there is no need for long planning enquiries. Bored tunnels are created

using boring tunnels, and there are a variety of these available which can operate in different

conditions, from hard rock to soft ground with a high water content. Another important thing that

the engineer needs to know is the stand-up time. This denotes how long the tunnel will stay up by

itself before support is needed. Obviously hard rock and certain clays will have a longer stand-up

time than sand and fine soils. Its also important to know the groundwater levels, because, if there is

any water leaking into the tunnel, the stand-up time will be reduced. Groundwater levels, however

can be reduced by ground freezing. Pipes are inserted into the ground surrounding the tunnel and

cooled. This surrounds the tunnel in frozen soil which keeps water out. Another way to reduce

groundwater levels is to pump the water out. Tunnel shape also affects the stand-up time. If atunnel is wider than it is high, it is more difficult to support, whereas if a tunnel is higher than is is

wide, the project is easier. Furthermore, rectangular or square tunnels are more difficult to support

than circular ones.

Now lets go on to the immersed tunnel....

1. Which of the following is defined as the number of children born per 1000 people per year?

Replacement Level

Fertility Rate

Birth Rate

Fertility Level

2. Which of the following countries in the UK has the highest fertility rate?

England

Scotland

Wales


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Northern Ireland

3. Why is fertility rate in the UK higher than it was twenty years ago?

Couples are choosing to have larger families.

A higher proportion of women are having children.

Women who delayed childbirth are having children now.

Fewer women are interested in their careers.

4. What proportion of women in their mid-forties do not have children nowadays?

10%

4%

25%

40%

5. What do French couples who have eight children receive?

A B

C D

6. Which of the reasons for low fertility rates is NOT mentioned?

Women are increasingly focused on their jobs.

People want to enjoy their lives before taking on responsibility.

Parents do not have time to have many children.

Children are considered to cost a lot of money.

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There Are All These New Books Out There Portraying Asian Mothers as Scheming