Abstract

The Joy Luck Club is written by a Chinese-American writer Amy Tan. It is a story about four groups of immigrant mothers and their American-raised daughters, focusing on the mothers’ struggles in China before liberation, their acceptance in America and their daughters’ struggles of finding themselves as Chinese-Americans.
This thesis studies the differences in values between these four pairs of Chinese-American mothers and daughters in The Joy Luck Club. The first pair Suyuan and Jing-mei’s differences mainly focus on family education and consumption. The second pair An-mei and Rose’s differences mainly lie in self-value and the sense of belonging. The third pair Lindo and Waverly’s differences are mainly on marriage and family education. The fourth pair Ying-ying and Lena’s differences mainly focus on marriage and consumption. Their differences in values are mainly caused by the different cultural backgrounds. The four mothers emigrated to America during the World War Two, and they had been all educated under the traditional Chinese culture while their daughters are born in America and lead the American-style life.
The purpose or significance of the thesis is to remind readers of a new vision of value differences and culture conflicts in the novel.  

Key Words: values  differences  Chinese-American mothers and daughters

摘 要

《喜福会》是美籍华裔女作家谭恩美的作品。小说主要描述了解放前夕从中国大陆移居美国的四位母亲的生活波折与她们在美国出生的女儿们之间的心理隔膜和恩恩怨怨。
该论文主要分析了《喜福会》中四对母女的价值观差异。第一对母女吴素云和吴精美之间的差异主要在于家庭教育和消费观；第二对母女许安梅和许露丝之间的差异主要在于自我价值和归属感；第三对母女龚琳达和薇弗莱之间的差异主要在于婚姻和家庭教育；第四对母女映映和丽娜之间的差异主要在于婚姻和消费观。这四对母女之间的差异主要源自不同文化背景。四位母亲在二战期间移居美国，但她们所受的是中国传统文化教育；而四位女儿出生在美国，所受的是美国现代文化教育。
本篇论文旨在帮助读者更好地理解不同文化背景下美籍华裔母女之间的价值观差异。

关键词：价值观  差异  美籍华裔母亲和女儿

1 Introduction
The Joy Luck Club is written by Amy Tan, a Chinese-American writer who is good at exploring the relationship between mothers and daughters. The Joy Luck Club is a story about four groups of immigrant mothers and their American-raised daughters, focusing on the mothers’ struggles in China before liberation, their acceptance in America and their daughters’ struggles of finding themselves as Chinese-Americans.