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AMERICAN WEST
Fourth Reading Workshop - Brian Price

"Easy things are not worth pursuing (p.288)"

1. In full group for the first fifteen minutes, identify all the
structural and design cues around which Tan organizes the text. 

2. In your groups of eight, organize each family's history
chronologically. That is, identify each significant event that affects the
life of each mother/daughter and put them into a time sequence. Write up
the four families' histories in parallel rows or columns on butcher paper.

Address the next three questions in your groups of eight:

3. What is each mother's internal (or philosophical) conflict?

4. What is each daughter's internal (or philosophical) conflict?

5. What is the main conflict between each mother and daughter pair?

The remaining questions are to help you organize your thinking for
Thursday's seminar: 

6. How does each mother and daughter see each other mother and daughter?

7. What is Chinese? What is American? What is Chinese-American?

8. Why does Tan construct the text with this structure and design instead
of taking each family one at a time and telling their stories
chronologically? 

Finally, this question might help you with your journal this week:

9. What does the text reveal about what might be Tan's take on the idea of
living deliberately in time and place?