The Drama Department
This is the name of the story’s narrator.
Who is Jing-mei?
This person is at the center of Jing-mei’s biggest conflict throughout the story.
Who is her mother?
This major theme is developed through Jing-mei’s struggle against her mother’s expectations.
What is the conflict between parental expectations and individual identity?
This object becomes one of the most important symbols in the story.
What is the piano?
This is the unusual condition of Jing-mei’s piano teacher.
What is deafness?
This famous child prodigy is who Mrs. Woo believes her daughter can become like.
Who is Shirley Temple?
Jing-mei’s mother expects her daughter to become this, while Jing-mei wants to decide her own future.
What is a prodigy?
Jing-mei wants this from her mother more than anything else.
What is the freedom to be herself?
Although Mrs. Woo wants Jing-mei to become successful, she ultimately tells her daughter that this is more important than being a prodigy.
What is doing your best?
This is the title of the television show Mrs. Woo was watching when she decided to sign Jing-mei up for piano lessons.
What is The Ed Sullivan Show?
This elderly piano teacher gives Jing-mei lessons, even though he cannot hear her playing.
Who is Mr. Chong?
This painful part of Mrs. Woo's past makes Jing-mei’s cruel statement about wishing she had never been born especially significant.
What is the loss of her other children?
The story shows that parents and children can have very different ideas about this.
What is success?
The title “Two Kinds” refers to the tension between these two different ideas about who Jing-mei should be.
What are her mother’s expectations and Jing-mei’s desire to be herself?
This painful part of Mrs. Woo's past makes Jing-mei’s cruel statement about wishing she had never been born especially significant.
What is the loss of her other children?
This character trait is shown when Jing-mei refuses to practice and deliberately stops trying to become a piano prodigy.
What is stubbornness/rebelliousness/independence?
Beneath the argument about piano lessons, Jing-mei and her mother are really fighting over this larger issue.
What is who gets to decide Jing-mei’s identity and future?
Jing-mei’s mother believes that with enough effort, a child can become almost anything. This belief connects to this larger idea.
What is the American Dream?
This event becomes a major turning point because Jing-mei’s failure publicly reveals the conflict between her and her mother.
What is the talent show?
Jing-mei was supposed to get a haircut to resemble Shirley Temple, but left the beauty shop with this famous character's hairstyle instead.
Who is Peter Pan?
As an adult, Jing-mei develops a more mature understanding of this character, realizing that her difficult expectations were connected to love and hope.
Who is her mother?
This conflict is both external and internal because Jing-mei fights with her mother while also struggling to figure out this about herself.
What is her identity/who she wants to become?
By the end of the story, Jing-mei realizes that her mother’s expectations were not simply about controlling her; they were also motivated by this.
What is love and hope for her daughter’s future?
At the end of the story, Jing-mei discovers that these two piano pieces fit together, symbolizing the different parts of her identity finally coming together.
What are “Pleading Child” and “Perfectly Contented”?
Jing-mei's cousin Waverly was known as this.
What is "Chinatown's Littlest Chinese Chess Champion"?