One legal issue that I identified in “Mother Tongue”, was when Tan’s mother asked her to talk to her stockbroker who refused to pay her. She explains, “…my mother was standing in the back whispering loudly, ‘Why he don’t send me check, already two weeks late. So mad he lie to me, losing me money.'”

The stockbroker took advantage of the fact that Tan’s mother was an immigrant whose English isn’t “clear”. He thought that because she didn’t understand English, he didn’t have to give her a check.

The legal issue that is displayed here is, discrimination based on race and work without pay