When analyzing any work of literature, it is important to focus on the text at hand and discover meanings inherent within rather than simply using the author’s intent as a guide. Some critics will go far as to suggest that one should avoid trying to follow the intent of the author at all and that may be okay for fiction, but in the case of an essay such as this, the advice is, at best, risky. It is clear enough what the agenda is for the writer and analysis should begin there, but if in the course of reading there appears to be some kind of obvious disconnect, it behooves interpretation to follow it as well.
The motive of the writer in the case of “The Good Daughter” is to make a statement about the peculiarity of the experience of the first-born-generation immigrant experience. The primary complaint is that she didn’t grow up steeped enough in the culture and traditions of the country in which her family was born and raised for generations whereas she was fully assimilated into American culture. Despite this, however, she goes on to complain “I identify with Americans, but American do not identify with me.”
Readers should be dubious about this assertion. And if the doubt is not misplaced, the result is that the entire framework of the author’s intent for this essay collapses. The problematic question of whether the premise of the essay is unsound derives directly from the content of the essay. Shortly after this statement, Hwang explains in detail how her romantic life has been directly driven by expectations that she will marry a fellow Korean. Her parents expect and, more importantly, she even admits that she dates non-Koreans that she knows will never become a relationship serious enough to consider marriage. Particularly unsettling—from the perspective of American assimilation pressures—is her statement that she’s “never been in love with someone I dated, or dated someone I loved.” See the problem there? The problem with the entire foundation of the essay’s argument? Hwang flat-out says that her parents “saw to it that I was became fully assimilated” but that seems hyperbolic at best for a woman who seems to be quite serious when she makes the veiled claim that she will only ever considered marrying a person of her own native descent. That is just simply something that doesn’t coincide with American assimilation.
And on that subject, one must question what the author really means when she lays claim to identifying with Americans. Her idea of “assimilation” into “American culture” consists entirely of hanging out at malls, fantasizing about male movie stars and applying logical rationality to determine the real meaning behind an older male student offering her a ride to the high school football game.
The author stakes a claim that she knows more about Europe than her own Korean culture even as she certifies having lived a romantic life as deeply situated in the idea of arranged marriages as anyone in Korea whereas the American culture she identifies with strongly basically describes shopping and entertainment. The premise of this essay is constructed upon the author’s assertion that she reached a crossroads in her life at which it became apparent she was suffering a cultural identity crisis. The text, on the other hand, strongly suggests that the real identity crisis at work here lies in misidentifying what constitutes culture.
