Question

Read the excerpt from "Mother Tongue." Lately, I’ve been giving more thought to the kind of English my mother speaks. Like others, I have described it to people as “broken” or “fractured” English. But I wince when I say that. It has always bothered me that I can think of no other way to describe it other than “broken,” as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed, as if it lacked a certain wholeness and soundness. Which best summarizes the central idea in the excerpt? Tan is troubled by the way her mother uses the English language. Tan is uncomfortable using negative terms to describe her mother’s English. Tan has difficulty trying to explain what she means when she writes in English. Tan has found that the English language is lacking in descriptive word choices.

Answer 1

Answer: Tan is uncomfortable using negative terms to describe her mother’s English.

It is uncomfortable for Tan to to accept that she has to use terms that have a negative denotation to describe her mother's speaking.

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Answer 2

Tan is uncomfortable using negative terms to describe her mother’s English.

Tan says that using the words "broken" or "fractured" to describe her mother's English makes it seem "as if it were damaged and needed to be fixed, as if it lacked a certain wholeness and soundness." Even though her mother's English may not be perfect, she doesn't feel that it is broken. It is simply different. Her ideas are not fractured, her thoughts are not broken. They are just not expressed within the complex grammatical structure that English uses.