<p>I don’t know why people are giving Amy Chua the attention that she is getting; she represents Chinese parents as much as Amy Tan represents the Chinese - in other words, very little. </p>
<p>Both take exaggerations and extreme cases in order to sensationalize what they are trying to say to a… mostly white audience (now that I think of it, not that diff. from Michelle Malkin either).</p>
<p>But still even as Amy Chua pointed out, as did the following Slate article, this type of driven parenting is an immigrant thing (and not really as she states, a Chinese thing or even a Chinese immigrant thing).</p>
<p>Privileged children of parents who have means/economic security tend to be much less driven.</p>
<p>And oh, I find it a bit ironic, that Amy Chua holds her daughters to such high standards and is seemingly so proud of what she perceives as the “Chinese” way of doing things and yet she married a relative “slacker.”</p>
<p>She’s seems quite extreme even for most Chinese parents. I actually think many of her descriptions go better with Korean parenting than Chinese parenting. However, they are even extreme for most Korean parents. China’s full of different ethnic groups, income levels, types of people, etc and if one looks at China in 2010 its pretty hard to classify a parenting style there. From a personal standpoint, I can tell you that almost none of my Chinese friends have parents anywhere near as strict as Mrs. Chua. The strictest parents Ive personally seen thus far have been Korean and Indian.</p>
<p>That also holds true for 1st gen immigrants from Eastern Europe and Africa (unless they happen to be independently wealthy).</p>
<p>The preprofessional track (esp. for medicine, the sciences and engineering) is seen as the safe route to economic security, and a more even playing field for minorities.</p>
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<p>Wrong.</p>
<p>The top schools overwhelmingly go for these (Asian) students - w/ perfect/near perfect grades/scores, multiple extracurricular activities AND something spectacular on the resume.</p>
<p>Any Asian or Asian-Am applicant who do not meet these ridiculous standards usually get the kabosh (pity the poor Asian-Am student who gets a B+ in a class b/c he/she spent too much time partying or playing sports/doing theater).</p>
<p>Ironically, these very same top schools are spending a lot of time and $$ to recruit more students from Asia (mainly China, Korea and India) instead of trying to recruit Asian-American students who are from lower socio-economic backgrounds and/or certain Asian ethnicities which don’t have as good of a record producing academic stars.</p>
<p>Basically, these schools are talking out of both sides of their mouths.</p>
<p>Without making a judgment about whether the topic of discussion is racist or not: if a statement about a culture is untrue or offensive or racist, having a member of that culture endorse it does not make it any less untrue or offensive or racist. One person can be wrong; one person can be wrong in a way that reinforces offensive or racist ideas; one person does not have the right to make broad, sweeping generalizations about an entire culture.</p>
<p>There’s not much more I desire to say on this subject, except that although I often complain or make jokes about Asian parents, I don’t recognize anything of my life or my parents in Chua’s article, or in much of what is being discussed here. I know Asian kids for whom this would not be the case–they would find a lot familiar in Chua’s parenting style, if not its extent–and I know Asian kids for whom the phrase “Asian parents” means little more than “irritatingly high standards in math.” I think the two groups are about equal in number; oddly, no one in the former is Chinese.</p>
<p>The “Jewish approach” during the height of Jewish immigration during the previous century (or for that matter, recent Jewish immigrants from former Soviet bloc states) isn’t much diff.</p>
<p>I’m sure all those Jewish kids really wanted to play the violin and piano and that all the esteemed Jewish musicians became world-reknowned after only practicing half an hour each day.</p>
<p>Chua is the extreme of extreme (certifiably wacky and abusive in my book); but today, Nigerian immigrant parents send their kids back to Nigeria for a year or 2 - partly to connect w/ the culture, but also to get their kids exposed to the more rigorous academics/studying (there is more intense academic competition in Nigerian schools b/c only the best and brightest students go on to college w/ the very best getting opportunities in the US or the UK).</p>
<p>Plenty do - but still, the best start to a musical education is classical music.</p>
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<p>I know Jewish, Greek, Russian, Caribbean, etc. parents who were really strict about academics and pushed their kids to the Ivies.</p>
<p>And then again, I also know the blue-blood WASP types who got ****ed b/c their son/daughter didn’t get accepted into their alma mater.</p>
<p>Also, the vast majority of parents fighting to get their kids into the top private schools in Manhattan (even for pre-school) are non-Asian.</p>
<p>And as discussed in another thread - the recruiters/decision makers at the super “white shoe” law firms, etc. which deem the lesser Ivies and schools like Stanford inadequate tend to be mostly non-Asian.</p>
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<p>Actually, in Asia, parents/schools of talented athletes also tend to put a disproportionate emphasis on sports, even if it means sacrificing academics.</p>
<p>Same goes for parents of kids trying to make it in the entertainment industry.</p>
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<p>Totally agree.</p>
<p>In the real world (the business world), a key, key part of climbing the corporate ladder/achieving success is people skills.</p>
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<p>Give me a break.</p>
<p>So Yo Yo Ma, Sarah Chang, Midori, etc. were “wooden”?</p>
<p>I guess Yuna Kim, Michelle Kwan and Kristi Yamaguchi were “wooden” on skates, too.</p>
<p>Violin (or another string instrument, such as the cello) and piano are just the best way to learn classical music.</p>
<p>In Asia, tennis isn’t very popular at all.</p>
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<p>Chinese-Am cuisine is overly greasy and frankly, ughh. For that matter, most of the cuisine from more authentic Chinese restaurants or home-cooked food (that I tried) isn’t that good either.</p>
<p>Chinese banquet cuisine (cuisine that was reserved for royalty/nobility) when done well, otoh, is really good.</p>
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<p>The one-child policy in China has resulted in the opposite; parents and grandparents indulging in their only child/grandchild - often resulting in spoiled children (“little king”/“little queen”), and for those who spent too much time watching TV and eating junk food, overweight kids (resulting in fat camps; a generation or 2 earlier, overweight kids were a point of pride).</p>
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<p>Let’s limit it to the Ivies but expand it to all Asian ethnicities; the percentage of Asians is around 15-16%.</p>
<p>Despite the fact that Asian-Ams have 3x the no. of college age pop., the % of Jews is significantly higher.</p>
<p>Also, a higher % of Asian-Am students attend community college than any other group.</p>
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<p>Nowadays, it’s more a fascist state than anything.</p>
<p>I’m a first generation Chinese-American, raised by Chinese immigrant parents with very high expectations. I was expected to get straight A’s throughout my academic career, I play the piano, I attend Chinese school, and I’ve done a whole host of extracurriculars, a large of number of which were purely for the sake of my college resume. I’ve been at times utterly miserable; I’ve felt suffocated by the pressure to succeed and I’ve wished that I didn’t have to live under such stress. Yet were I to do it all over again, I wouldn’t have it any other way. The way I’ve been raised has instilled me with expectations and standards for myself. I’m not personally satisfied with any grade less than an A and I would be utterly disappointed if I failed on any front to win an academic or extracurricular award. I’m glad I have this high degree of expectations for myself.</p>
<p>I am, however, allowed a very high degree of freedom, perhaps even more than some of my white friends. I’m allowed out very late, even on weeknights; my parents let me skip schools on days where I feel like I absolutely need to; I can hang out with friends whenever I tell my parents I don’t have any homework. A lot of my friends envy me and tell me they wish their parents were as lax as mine. But, the reason my parents give me the freedom that they do is because I consistently achieve. I get high grades and win awards, and I was recently admitted early action to two different Top 10 universities.</p>
<p>In a way, I think I’m lucky, because just by coincidence I was able to live up to my own and my parents’ expectations. If I hadn’t been able to present my parents with the results they expected, free from excessive pressure from them, I expect they would have employed some of the measures that Chua did. Maybe the reason Chua’s measures weren’t necessary for me was because I felt some of that drive on an internal level.</p>
<p>I think that if I ever have kids, I would hope they would have that same internal drive. But if they didn’t, I wouldn’t hesitate to drive them with the same intensity Chua used. Perhaps some of her methods are somewhat excessive, but I do agree entirely with her sentiments.</p>
<p>If you were utterly miserable at times even though you are internally driven, how do you think a child with less talent and less drive would feel? When parents measure the worth of their kids’ by achievements like high grades and winning awards, then things get pretty tough for the kids who simply aren’t going to be #1 in everything – worse, if the parents have a narrow view of which activities are important, then the less-than-perfect kid doesn’t have an opportunity to cultivate and develop other areas of interest and talent, particularly those with are not competitive and don’t involve getting awards. </p>
<p>I have two kids and didn’t push either one of them. They turned out fine. One was more internally driven than the other and ended up going to a better college and getting more academic recognition, but that doesn’t make much of a difference in the workplace. The laid back kid has had a few accomplishments that i’m very impressed with as well – there’s a time and a place for everything.</p>
<p>Well, I agree with one thing that Chua espouses: that TV is the root of many evils! I really believe that excessive TV, especially in early childhood, decreases reasoning skills.</p>
<p>And all of this finds its roots in Chinese exam-based academic history. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Gaokao-like exams became national during the Sui dynasty. The textbooks call it “Keju Kaoshi”. More often than not, you read about these poets and/or writers in ancient China who spent decades studying for Keju, which was held once every few years. Keju eventually evolved into Gaokao while the tradition of exam-cramming lived on. As a result, Chinese parents typically place a huge amount of emphasis on exams and academics, although this differs among families.</p>
<p>I’ve seen fellow classmates whose parents put little pressure on them to do well in school and I’ve seen a very small number who are, in many ways, testing machines. While I’ve reaped the benefits of Chinese parenting, I would have preferred the freedom of choosing a non-academic path.</p>
<p>It seems to me that there are valuable aspects to be taken from all cultures, which is one of the great things about our country, honestly.</p>
<p>I wish I’d known about the math stuff that the asian parents around here do for their kids when they are younger. I think my kids would have benefitted from that just tremendously. OTOH, I think that there is a lot to be said for letting kids find their own path.</p>
<p>The ideal is probably to present them with every available advantage and let them gravitate to their strengths. Deepak Chopra actually talks about that in one of his books…</p>
<p>Still, there is no reason not to benefit from what we see that other groups are doing to “benefit” their kids. Our current soccer system in the US has grown out of the south american and European system, and this benefits those kids who are on that track, and I’ve never heard anyone call us soccer parents crazy.</p>
<p>The greatest strength we have is our collective wisdom. Clearly this woman is completely over the top and is also failing to benefit from some of the wisdom of other cultures around her. There is no reason for the rest of us to be as silly as she is. YMMV</p>
<p>I begin with a disclaimer. I haven’t read the book yet…just the advance publicity.</p>
<p>I cannot support Ms. Chua’s insistence on limiting her children’s choices. I also do not believe in shaming a child. I am a high school teacher, and a very demanding one sometimes. I am very willing to give my students and my children an honest assessment of their academic performance. I do have, as Ms. Chua does, high expectations of my students. But I am more likely to encourage them, by telling them that I believe they can do it and that they need to believe more in themselves and have as much faith in themselves as I have in them. It works like a charm, both with my own children and my students. They work harder, willingly, and the pleasure they get when they succeed is wonderful to watch. You don’t have to be a dragon, or unreasonable or coercive, just relentlessly persistent with encouragement and support and appreciation of the effort they put in. I stay after school for hours of extra help for my students and my husband and I are willing to spend as much time as it takes with our children, without in any way shaming or coercing them. I have a very motivated older daughter who plays two instruments that SHE chose (piano and viola) and who got into some very good schools. She continues to play both instruments with great enthusiasm even though she is now in college. She is close to us and calls us regularly to tell us about her life in college. I do not think that we could have had such a good relationship with her if we had been coercive. </p>
<p>On another note, I do know many Asian parents who have similar high expectations but are not in any way tyrannical. Their children have a high degree of autonomy. I cannot believe that the majority of Asian parents use Ms. Chua’s techniques. At least, I hope not.</p>
<p>I am reposting Slithey Tove’s link to the James Fallows piece which itself contains a link to “our friends at NMA TV in Taiwan, who have prepared one of their famous computer-generated renderings of the Battling Mothers Smackdown” (shot of the violin-practicing daughter standing in a tub of burning coals .) [The</a> Only Thing I Will Say on the ‘Chinese Mother’ Debate - James Fallows - International - The Atlantic](<a href=“The Only Thing I Will Say on the 'Chinese Mother' Debate - The Atlantic”>The Only Thing I Will Say on the 'Chinese Mother' Debate - The Atlantic) And thank you, SlitheyTove!</p>
<p>I haven’t read the book, but have met the principle people involved. Pizzagirl’s estimate is pretty spot on. Whatever else it is, the book is a wondrously, amazingly successful piece of self-promotion. </p>
<p>There is a more than a tinge of self-righteousness, intense self-promotion and racism in Ms. Chua’s position (at least as revealed through the WSJ excerpts).</p>
<p>The book has some funny moments, and at times she appears to step outside and laugh at her over-the-top obsessions – but then she just keeps keeping on. I don’t care how selfless she claims to be, it’s very much about her ego, specifically being able to say that she had children who played at Carnegie Hall / went to a Juilliard program. There’s never any questioning of why it’s so important to be #1 at everything you do. </p>
<p>Her level of micromanagement of their music was truly over the top. She describes vacationing with extended family members in exotic and historic locations - yet the daughters still have to practice their violin and piano for X hours a day on vacation, so they miss out on the sights because she’s rented piano practice rooms for them. It’s evident that they had the resources for a lot of foreign travel, which is terrific – too bad that her obsession prevented the kids from fully taking advantage of that. She also seems very oblivious to the feelings of others - even though she speaks fondly of her parents and IL’s, she doesn’t seem to care that they are on these vacations too and that they’d rather go to dinner / go see the sights, than sit in their hotel rooms and wait for the daughters to be done musical practice. Even her parents tell her to chill out on this. </p>
<p>It reminded me of when my kids took piano and we were all ready to call it quits but H wanted them to continue - and as we talked about it more, it became evident that H really wanted to play the piano, it was HIS dream, not theirs. When reading the book, I was tempted to say, if you want to hear the violin played at that level, then why don’t YOU take up the violin.</p>
<p>I thought it was interesting how she micromanaged each note of their music practice and there is really no mention of her own musical training. I would think that would not be helpful to the girls’ playing of their instruments. The girls really had some high-end teachers and she did say that the musical talent most likely came from her husband’s side of the family. My kids were run-of-the-mill band students and I wouldn’t have had any idea how to get involved in their practice.</p>
<p>Also, there was very little mention of the girls’ academics. I imagine they are very capable students and easily make A’s without a huge effort. They certainly have the genetics for brilliance.</p>