It's all about literature. Literature depicts life.

1. A Pair of Tickets
by Amy Tan
Mariana Mahyuddin
Lim Jia Lih
PISMP JAN 2014 (1.1)
IPG KAMPUS BAHASA ANTARABANGSA
KUALA LUMPUR.

2. Jing Mei goes to China to meet her twins half-sisters with her father.
Her twins half-sisters were separated from their mother during the
invasion of Japanese in China. Their mother, Suyuan, had left her
sisters hoping that they would have chance to survive. After the war,
she began to search for them. However, Suyuan moved to America
with her new husband after she gave up in looking for her lost
daughters. Throughout Jing Mei's life, she never accept herself as
Chinese. As she is on the journey, she begins to discover more about
her family. After meeting her sisters, she then realizes that her family is
the part where she is recognized as Chinese.
Summary of "A Pair of Tickets"
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014

3. Cultural Theory
• The practice of describing, interpreting, and evaluating
culture. Cultural criticism makes the term culture refer to
popular and classic culture. It breaks down the boundary
between high and low culture.
http://www.slideshare.net/susiswo/cultural-criticism
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014

4. Identity Crisis
• Jing Mei, the protagonist, has conflict on her culture identity as she
was born in California but her parents were from China.
• She refuses to admit she is a Chinese but her mother keeps on
insisting it.
a) "Cannot be helped,"my mother said when I was fifteen and had
vigirously denied that I had any Chinese whatsoever below my skin.
I was a sophomore at Galileo High in San Francisco, and all my
Caucasian friends agreed: I was about as Chinese as they were.
(Page 120)
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014
ACCEPTANCE OF ONE OWN CULTURE

5. Identity (cont.)
• She prefers to use English rather than Chinese language to
communicate.
a) "Hello," I say to the little girl. "My name is Jing Mei." But the little girl
squirms to look away, causing her parents to laugh with
embarassment. I try to think of Cantonese words I can say to her,
stuff I learned from friends in China town, but all I can think of are
swear words, terms for bodily functions, and short phrases like
"tastee good", "tastes like garbage," and "she's really ugly". (Page
125)
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014

6. Importance of family
• In Chinese culture, relationship between family members are very
important. The strength of closeness among them is very strong.
• In this story, the importance of a family is potrayed through Jing
Mei's father, Canning Woo, and his aunt, Aiyi.
a) Aiyi continues to scold my father. "I was so beside myself, ask my
son, almost turned heaven and earth upside down trying to think of
a way! So we decided the best was for us to take bus from Toishan
and come into Guangzhou - meet you from the start. (Page 126)
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014
STRENGTH OF FAMILY BONDS

7. Self-discovery
• Her journey back to China is like her self enlightment where she
starts to aware of being a Chinese. From this journey, she gets to
know more about her mother's experience when losing her sisters
during the war, her father's relatives in China and even the meaning
of her own name.
a) As we wave good-bye one more time and enter the waiting area, I
get the sense I am going from one funeral to another. In my hand
I'm clutching a pair of tickets to Shanghai. (Page 133)
marianamahyuddin_pismpjan2014
And now I also see what part of me is Chinese. It is so obvious.
It is my family. It is in our blood. After all these years, it can
finally be let go. (Page 134)

8. Lim Jia Lih-2014 8
MINOR LITERARY THEORY
LIM JIA LIH
PISMP TESL JAN 2014
GROUP 1.1
A pAir of tickets
by
Amy TAn

9. Lim Jia Lih-2014 9
Biography
Amy Tan was born in Oakland,
Carlifornia, in 1952. Both of her
parents were recent Chinese immigrants.
Her father was an electrical engineer (as
well as a Baptist minister) while her
mother was a vocational nurse. Tan
began to write her first novel The Joy
Luck Club (1989). The Joy Luck
Club became both a critical success and a
best-seller, and was made into a movie in
1993.
AMY
TAN

10. Lim Jia Lih-2014 10
Social criticism
Definition
- An approach to literature that examines social
groups, relationships, and values as they are
manifested in literature. Sociological
approaches emphasize on how society and
historical events shape a writer's work. Such
readings treat literature as either a document
reflecting social conditions or a product of
those conditions. (Murfin & Supryia, 2009)

11. Lim Jia Lih-2014 11
Love of mother
-Love of mother is one of the social values that presents in this story.
When there is any social conflicts or natural calamities happened,
love of mother is clearly shown. Suyuan’s love towards her children
makes her leaves them on the road side during her escape from war
because she does not want her children to die with her.
Besides, Suyuan who loses her twin daughter during war is still worried
about them. Therefore, she uses every way and mean to search for
them. She still wishes to find her long lost daughters herself although
she is too old to go back to China due to her love to them.
EXP: And then she knew she could not bear to watch her children die with her.”“
(pg 130)
EXP: When letters could be openly exchanged between China and the United States, she“
wrote immediately to old friends in Shanghai and Kweilin”.
“Every year, your mother wrote to different people. And this last year, I think she got a
big idea in her head, to go to China and find them herself.” (pg 132)

12. Lim Jia Lih-2014 12
Chinese society relationship
The good relationship between Chinese people in society is
maintained throughout the story. This can be shown by an
officer of Kuomintang who saves Suyuan and her twin babies’
life by informing her to run for safety as their lives are in
danger. Besides, there are two good Samaritans who are
willing to pick up and take good care of Suyuan’s twin babies
rather than leaving them to die. This clearly shows that
people are still willing to help each other during war period.
“They were pious people, Muslims, who believed the twins
babies were a sign of double luck.” “She showed the girls the
picture of their mother and told them they had been born
into a great family and she would take them back to see
their true mother and grandparents.”(pg 131&132)

13. Lim Jia Lih-2014 13
Chinese society relationship
Besides, Chinese people also understand and cooperate with
each other well. This can be shown from the decision Auntie
Lindo makes when a letter from the long lost twins arrives
from Shanghai after their mother’s death. She brings that
letter to Joy Luck Club (a woman’s social group) to discuss the
best answer to this letter with Auntie Ying and Auntie An-mei.
This shows that they are very understanding and willing to
support each other.
“Canning Woo gave the letter to her wife’s old friend, Auntie
Lindo. Instead she took the letter to the Joy Luck Club and
discussed with Auntie Ying and Auntie An-mei what should
be done, because they had known many years about my
mother’s search for her twin daughter,...”
(pg 121)

14. Lim Jia Lih-2014 14
Family structure
In Chinese family structure in China, all generations are living together
under one roof. For them, this is how family should be. Besides,
family members do thing together and never leave anyone to catch
up.
They are also having a practice where all the family members must
present when meeting a family member coming from far.
- If she was in the house with that doll, her parents were there, and so everybody“
was there, waiting together, because that’s how our family was.”(pg 124)
- we had enough there last few years to build a big house, three stories, all of new“
brick, big enough for our whole family and then some.”(pg 126)
“They are Aiyi’s oldest son and his wife, and standing next to them are four other
people, around my age and a little girl who’s around ten.” (pg 125)

15. 15
References
Murfin, R., & Supryia, M. R. (2009). The Bedford
Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms. (3rd
ed.). New York: Bedford Books.
X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. (2007).
Introduction to Fiction. (10th
ed.). United
States: Pearson.
Cultural criticism. (n.d.) Retrieved on 19
February 2014 from
http://www.slideshare.net
/susiswo/cultural-criticism