In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, Amy Chua, an author and professor at Yale Law School, wrote an essay explaining, “Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior.” She takes a pretty extreme stance and paints a damning picture of so-called “Western parenting.” As one commenter said, “I am in disbelief after reading this article.”
Here are some things Chua doesn’t let her daughters do:
• attend a sleepover
• have a playdate
• be in a school play
• complain about not being in a school play
• watch TV or play computer games
• choose their own extracurricular activities
• get any grade less than an A
• not be the No. 1 student in every subject except gym and drama
• play any instrument other than the piano or violin
• not play the piano or violin.
Whether you’re outraged or in complete agreement, Chua’s essay—at the very least—will make you think. Read the rest, and let us know your thoughts.
—Photo sherrattsam/Flickr
Why is the art of music required to endure the ill-informed antics of such inartistic imbeciles as Amy Chua? Her lust for fame as an old-fashioned stage mother of either a famous violinist (yet another mechanical Sarah Chang?) or a famous pianist (yet another mechanical Lang Lang?) shines through what she perceives as devotion to the cultivation of the cultural sensitivities of her two unfortunate daughters. Daughter Lulu at age 7 is unable to play compound rhythms from Jacques Ibert with both hands coordinated? Leonard Bernstein couldn’t conduct this at age 50! And he isn’t the only musician of achievement… Read more »
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I believe some useful purpose will be served by offering here, what the lawyers might like to call, but will seldom welcome, a healthy second opinion; a collective opinion that will demonstrate in abbreviated form the absolute folly of any attempt to teach music to children in the manner advocated by Amy Chua and her supporters. These titles, with a few accompanying comments, should be read only as an introduction to a vast, interesting subject. There is one observation one can make about them all, and many more on this same subject, if needed to prove the point: Their attempt… Read more »
Professor Chua is a woefully ill-informed parent, one ignorant of just what is happening in some parts of education in America. Fully confident in her presumed success as a writer with an editorial staff at Penguin shadow boxing for her and unapologetically wearing her signature plastic smile for public appearances, the Lawyer Chua is trying to persuade and convince; on both counts controversially, but with enough negative reactions to cause her subsequently to attempt a dilution of the intensity in her initial self-congratulatory tirade by latterly asserting that her writing is merely one person’s experiences of some trying times in… Read more »
I divide my year annually between New York and Shanghai. One of my common visitations in the latter city is to the area in and around The Shanghai Conservatory of Music. About four years back the school built a large new building on Fenyang Lu. Along the street side is a lower level with a string of music stores stocked with new instruments. In four of those stores I counted, literally, one trumpet, one horn, one trombone, no tuba, two flutes, one clarinet, one oboe, no bassoon, a handful of strings (but no string bass), and two-hundred pianos! The single… Read more »
There is a recurring theme without solid core that continues to recycle on the question of Amy Chua and her style as a mother. J.G. (unfortunately anonymous, as are most of the endorsements of Professor Chua) has written I think it’s easy to take cheap shots at Chua, but it’s hard to argue that the average American child needs less discipline, less direction or less respect for others. It might seem amusing to mock her (her “cushy job” and “hottie husband”), but harder to actually consider the points being made in a non-defensive way, without trying to paint yourself as… Read more »
I’m in disbelief, and do agree American parents coddle children too much, but there’s a reason suicide rates are so high in places like China and Japan. There’s too much unreasonable pressure being put on these children. A lot of these children don’t end up as happy as their parents make them seem. It’s good to stress academic success, but academic success is a very subjective thing as well. My parents raised me and stressed that I just needed to try my hardest, and if trying my hardest warranted a B, then so be it. I didn’t grow up any… Read more »
In a country like China, which is still predominantly poor, everyone is striving to better themselves. Amy Chua’s philosophy of childrearing fits right in. It’s more problematic in affluent societies such as the United States’, where we have the luxury to think about issues such as the meaning of success and personal fulfillment. Profesor Chua suggests American parents are too permissive, too concerned with their children’s self-esteem. She says we over-protect them from failure. These are easy pronouncements that gloss over complex realities. For example, protecting a child from feelings of failure, such as by overpraising, doesn’t build self-esteem, it… Read more »
if success is measured only by how many A’s you acheive or how many instruments you play, then I guess her approach works. I wish for a lot more for my kids than that. Although I don’t disagree that we are way too concerned in this country with our children’s self-esteems’ (don’t keep score rules). Alittle balance probably wouldn’t hurt.