Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Book Review: HOW MY PARENTS LEARNED TO EAT.

A. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Say, Allen.1984. HOW MY PARENTS LEARNED TO EAT. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 0395442354.

B. PLOT SUMMARY
The protagonist is a Japanese American girl whose mother is Japanese and father is an American sailor. Her parents meet and fall in love when her father’s ship is stationed in Yokohama. They both enjoy spending time talking and walking on the street, having a wonderful time to get together. However, they both are afraid of making a date to meet and eat because they do not know how to use each other’s eating implement like, forks, knives and chopsticks. In order to make a deep impression to each other and show their love, her mother learns to use forks and knives and her father practices eating noodles with chopsticks. Finally they can have dates and eat together in both eastern and western restaurants. Now it is natural in the protagonist’s family to eat with chopsticks some days and with knives and forks other days.

C. CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Say’s stories present magnificent cultural markers which connect to Japanese culture; therefore, it is easy to find Japanese cultural makers in this book. For example, on the cover, it shows local Japanese food courts decorated with signs in Japanese characters and traditional ornaments, such as red lamplights on streets. Meanwhile, it also show Japanese styled tables and stools in outdoor noodle shops and the ways the customer standing in line to order food to eat with chopsticks in front of the chef presenting people’s ordinary life on the street as cultural markers. Skin tones, facial figures and hair styles in the illustrations present cultural markers. Say also presents traditional and contemporary Japanese lives in the clothing, foods, dishes, and kitchen appliances through his illustrations. For example, the elders and waitresses wear kimonos and slippers with their hair in a bun style. Women in younger generations have straight hair and wear skirts with high heels. Men wear lightly colored shirts and pants. People eat sushi, sukiyaki and soup with chopsticks and they bow to each other, display other cultural marker.

Language plays less important roles to identify cultural markers in this book. In addition, the names of the protagonist’s mother, two food names and few Japanese characters on street signs, it is difficult to find Japanese words and sounds in the text. It is good for reading but less relates to cultural markers. In order to present the protagonist feels free to live in two different cultural life style, Say provides the eastern life style, wear kimono, eat Japanese food with chopstick in the first page, and the western life style in the last page, such as wearing a dress with an eating clothe, eating with a fork and a knife. The author is also very careful to combine the different cultural kitchen utensils in these two pages, such as a rice cooker, a pepper mill, a toaster and, a Japanese tea can and tea pot in the last page to show cultural differences in a very detail.

This book provides realistic portrayals of people’s lives in Yokohama after World War II and how they accommodate with conflicts in cross-culture; however, Say does not explore the cultural values, facts and attitudes in depth; therefore, readers can not formulate informed thought by themselves.

D. REVIEW EXCERPTS
From the Publisher: “An American sailor courts a young Japanese woman and each tries, in secret, to learn the other's way of eating.”
School Library Journal: “The book is wonderfully thought-provoking in its portrayal of the subtle similarities and differences among cultures.”

Reading Rainbow: “An American sailor courts a Japanese girl and each tries, in secret, to learn the other's way of eating. The two discover that when learning to eat using different tableware, manners, and customs, people often encounter problems, as well as triumphs.”

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