Memoir or Parenting Guide?: Amy Chua's New Book Charges Debate

 No parent likes taking advice from others about how to raise their children. That much is certain. Even more certain is a parent's idea of what is "normal" or "good" behavior from their child. If you go to Amy Chua's house, you better not say a peep!

The Yale law professor recently released her book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, which has garnered mass criticism from readers and television talking heads for its account of the strict practices used by Chinese parents, including Chua's own immigrant parents. Chua has stressed that the book is intended to be a humorous memoir, not an instruction manual, about her somewhat failed attempts to mimic such parenting styles with her own daughters.

This miscommunication is not completely unreasonable. In the book, Chua explains that her daughters Sophia and Louisa, now 18 and 15, respectively, were forbidden to both attend and hold sleepovers, participate in school plays, and receive any grade less than an A, among a myriad of other enforcements. Reading an excerpt from the book in which Chua tells how she threatened to give her daughter's doll house to the Salvation Army if she didn't master a difficult piano piece, it's easy to see the potential concern. As a disclaimer, the book jacket says "This is a story about a mother, two daughters, and two dogs. This was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better than raising kids than Western ones. But instead, it's about a biter clash of cultures, a fleeting taste of glory, and how I was humbled by a thirteen year old." But as Stephen Colbert astutely noted, the jacket comes off.

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But Chua has repeatedly defended her methods, while pointing out the "deadpan" humor in them, which no one but her seems to really find laughable. To be fair, what do you expect from a junior law professor at Yale? She must not understand the meaning of the word very well.

Two major quarrels people have expressed with the book are Chua's obsession with perfection, and the apparent cultural superiority Chua gives to Chinese parenting styles. She insists that no matter one's race or gender, anyone "can be a Chinese mother." Many believe that Chua only encourages the cultural dominance by the Chinese in an effort to become the prevailing economic and academic superpower in the world, a title we are embarrassed to admit we desire as well. Chua says that the values she herself was raised on, such as work ethic and refusal to settle for second place, are no less American than Coke and Snickers. And this is true. But what people then become concerned about is her level of severity in teaching her daughters how to achieve.

It must be noted that both Sophia and Louisa, affectionately called Lulu, are both A students and the winners of numerous musical awards. Where Westerners and Easterners differ is on matters of importance. Chua says that Westerners may coddle their children and raise them to feel entitled to success, whereas the Chinese believe that everything is earned and the best way to prepare them for the world is to not make anything easy. But what is more important for a person, individualism and recognition of personal strengths, or exceeding the competition and trying to be the best at something which may not even interest you to begin with? This is where Chua experienced rebellion. Her daughter, I'm unsure with one, desired to play tennis instead of the violin. Her mother conceded, but not without struggle.

What must clearly be distinguished are the years-old contrasts between the child-parent relationships of Westerners and the Chinese. Chua describes how Chinese children are forever indebted to their parents and therefore must live lives of pride and repayment to the parents. Chua's husband Jed once pointed out to her that children do not choose to be brought into the world. He said that for this reason, children owe their parents nothing.

This factors into the common tradition of respect for one's elders. I have never been to China, but I would think that the suggestion to stick Grandma in a nursing home because no one wants her to live with them would be unheard of. The exchange is different for Easterners. The American principle of independence has evolved from its origins as a political coup to a modern sense of single-mindedness. Americans love their independence and love to have complete control over their lives. Everyone lives for his or her self, and no one else has the right to say otherwise.

Maybe this is ungrateful? Maybe this is simply the natural progression after industrialization? Whatever the case, Sophia and Louisa have not expressed any contempt or resentment or their mother, and have made her proud.