Countless of legal issues can be spotted throughout Amy Tans story “Mother Tongue” But the one that sticks out to me most is when she talks about businesses refusing service and discriminating against her mother. In her story she states, “The fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her.” This could have become a law suit if Amy Tan had pleased. She could have sued each businesses for discrimination, as well as the employees for not treating her mother with the proper service and for belittling her by ignoring her. I personally was upset by the way Amy Tans mother was treated. I felt like they had no reason to treat her the way they did, she was still a customer and deserved to be treated just like anyone else regardless of the language barrier. The businesses should’ve put more effort into helping her and giving her assistance.

One legal issue that really stood out for me in “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan is the issue of racial discrimination when Tan describes the painful encounter between her mother and her doctor. The purpose of the visit was “to find out about a benign brain tumor a CAT scan had revealed a month ago.” Amy explains that despite the fact that her mother had spoken her best English to the doctor, “the hospital did not apologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan and she had come for nothing.” The author goes even further to describe the behavior of the hospital: … “they did not seem to have any sympathy when she told them she was anxious to know the exact diagnosis, since her husband and son had both died of brain tumors.” It is almost as though the doctors don’t care about their own patient, because of their own biases towards Tan’s mother because she is an immigrant and she isn’t speaking perfect English. This all changed however when Tan herself called the hospital: “And when the doctor finally called her daughter, me, who spoke in perfect English — lo and behold — we had assurance that the CAT scan would be found, promises that a conference call on Monday would be held, and apologies for any suffering my mother gone through for a most regrettable mistake.” Suddenly, their behavior shifts completely when Amy Tan is on the phone. They treat her with respect, which they had denied her mother. What is so telling about this scene is the complete and utter disrespect and lack of care from a hospital to their patient because of their ethnicity: The doctor’s office claims that they lost the CAT scan. This disrespect has devastating consequences. One can only imagine what would happen if Amy Tan’s mother didn’t get the results of the CAT scan. The doctor at the hospital looks at Amy’s Chinese immigrant mom as inferior and not worthy of dignity and good care. This is not a singular case and it  happens all the time to immigrants of other nations, and people of color, but it was interesting for me to read about the discrimination faced by Chinese immigrants in America. In this case, Amy Tan’s mother can easily sue the hospital on the grounds of racial discrimination, but also on the grounds of medical malpractice.

After this reading, this story “Mother’s Tongue” by Amy Tan, describes many legal issues but I’ll talk about one that really stood out for me and it was (quoted) “because when I was growing up, my mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say That is because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect. And I had plenty of empirical evidence to support me: the fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her”.This quote describes that how her mother had to face racial and linguistic discrimination. Just because she wasn’t perfect at speaking English, people bullied her. Whenever she went somewhere didn’t really get the treatment as she should just like other normal citizens. People used to ignore whatever her mother said, they never took her seriously always insulted her just because she wasn’t “perfect ” in their language. This is actually a violation of freedom of rights which is the first amendment and basics rights of every civilian who lives in the USA.

After reading ‘Mother Tongue’, by Amy Tan, I did notice quite a few legal issues and questions. One of the most noticeable legal issue I’ve noticed within the story can be seen on Page 3, Paragraph 4, Sentence 3, “I started writing nonfiction as a freelancer the week after I was told by my former boss that writing was my worst skill and I should hone my talents toward account management.”

Now, some may ask, “how is this a legal issue?” Well, if Amy Tan found it necessary, she could’ve sued her boss for direct racial harassment because her boss at that time made a comment that backs the stigma in society where Asian Americans are mainly are often seen only for their exceptional potential in math oriented careers and nothing else and are often discriminated due to this. This is further backed by Amy later in the story, when she states questions brought to her such as, “Why are there not more Asian Americans represented in American literature?”, “Why are there few Asian Americans enrolled in creative writing programs?”, “Why do so many Chinese students go into engineering!” Those are all questions that employers in countless companies and positions still has yet to answer.

Nevertheless, making comments, especially as a authoritative figure, telling someone from the Asian American decent, that writing is their worst skill and they should focus their talents towards account management, that is overall harassment in the workplace and yes, they can be sued for such a reason.

In My mothers tongue , one of the legal issues that i seen is when Amy talks about when her mother tries to speak the English language . she talks about how people wouldn’t give her good service , or act like they don’t understand her or hear her. The legal issue is discrimination,or even a hate crime.

“My mother had gone to the hospital for an appointment, to find our about a benign brain tumor a CAT scan had revealed a month ago…Still, she said, the hospital did not apologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan and she had come for nothing. She said they did not seem to have any sympathy when she told them she was anxious to know the exact diagnosis… She said they would not give her any more information until the next time and she would have to make another appointment for that… And when the doctor finally called her daughter, me,who spoke in perfect English–lo and behold–we had assurances the CAT scan would be found, promises that a conference call on Monday would be held, and apologies for any suffering ,my mother had gone through for a most regrettable mistake.” This quote identifies a legal issue is discrimination,language discrimination is that a real legal issue? However, it also can fall in the category of discrimination against civil rights being injustice based upon national origin and race.Amy Tan’s mom was being treated unfairly against the characteristics of her speech, her accent, vocabulary and structure or order of her words when speaking to the doctors.The hospital didn’t feel any remorse for how she felt and instead told her she had to do a whole new one appointment to get a new CAT scan just because of a mistake that was being made from the hospital itself not her. Nevertheless, when her daughter spoke to the doctor’s in perfect English they granted them with a whole new attention,reassures in solving the issue and taking full responsibility of losing the CAT scan.They mostly focused upon the style of speech used by the individual and then being prejudice based upon it, perhaps as well as appearance. Instead of satisfying,helping their patients concerns, needs and clarifying their errors.Can this still exist today? Is their fewer cases like this in the United States? Which courts are involved with this solving this legal issue?