Are you a Chinese Tiger Mother?
Amy Chua’s book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, is the story of how Amy brought up her children in the USA under the ‘Tiger Mother’ parenting style. Very strict discipline, a packed study schedule, lots of extra curricular studying and learning and practicing the violin and piano. Even at a very young age such as 5 years old. The Tiger Mother does not allow sleepovers or play dates and views an A- as a ‘bad grade’. Although I don’t raise my own children in this way, I do agree with having high expectations for them and I do believe in the importance of sticking with something even though it might be difficult or challenging. It is a skill they can draw upon later in life. It also raises their confidence and their expectations of themselves. I don’t push them as a Tiger Mother would, rather I teach them by my own example and encourage them and praise them. At times, I do wonder if I am not doing enough for them or pushing them hard enough.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading Battle Hymn because, unsurprisingly, I’m fascinated by how cultural differences and backgrounds influence the way we parent and how we raise our children. Read Bringing Up Brits and you’ll see what I mean! Battle hymn is not only about the discipline, it is also about cultural differences, the emotional journey of a parent and our innate desire for our children to be able to acheive all they want to acheive.
Wonderland: Meet Britain’s Chinese Tiger Mums. This is worth a watch! I particularly related to the Canadian Taiwanese mother. She emphasised the process of learning and how that is good for the child’s future approach to life. Two of the other Chinese mothers emphasised studying hard to eventually get a good job and earn lots of money. It seemed the driving factor was wealth – not to get rich, but to be well-off and be able to provide for themselves and their families and have status. The British dad married to the Taiwanese mother was hilarious. No question about who wears the pants in their marriage! I really felt for him because he just wanted to play with his daughter – all he wanted was for her to be happy and to be able to play. I suppose she has the best of both worlds – a Tiger mother and a laid back British father. It’s interesting what Amy Chua’s daughter says about her mother now at the age of 18. She is her mother’s daughter – see the video below.
I only know two Chinese mothers raising their children in Britain and they do not seem like Tiger Mothers at all. I would love to meet a Tiger mother here in Britain.
My dear friend Heidi who is American and married to a British husband, is currently raising her three British born children in Beijing. I wonder if she has met any Tiger mothers? Has her parenting style and the way she raises her children been influenced by other mothers and families in China?
Amy Chua the “Tiger mom” talks with Gretchen Carlson:
Wonderland – Series 4. Meet Britain’s Chinese Tiger Mums – Click Here to view
If you like this blog, then buy Bringing Up Brits BUY HERE or buy from AMAZON.
Meghan, What a timely post! Would you believe I just finished reading Amy Chua’s book this week. My friend Sharon lent it to me and I couldn’t put it down and finished it in 2 evenings, snatching every minute I could while the kids are still on winter break from school.
I had initially been very put off by the fact that in promoting the book, the media seemed to miss the point that Amy states on the cover – “how I was humbled by a thirteen year old.” That was the element I was actually interested in yet that probably doesn’t sell as many books. Anyway, I loved reading it and found it fascinating since I am the completely opposite type of parent. I was in tears when I read how she told Lulu that her homemade birthday card was not good enough. This year my daughter, Madison, made me a beautiful card for my birthday with a unique poem about what she loves about having me as a Mom that I will treasure forever. What really amazed me about it was the fact that she wrote it in a few minutes before I woke up. I love the intrinsic motivation she displayed that I really felt was missing from what I read in Amy’s book. I also felt that there was not room for the girls to display their own unique, creative ideas, desires. Who knows how successful they could have been if they had been allowed to follow their own desires instead of their mothers definition of success – the stereotypical definition which holds classical music, and the Ivy League as the only measure of success that is considered worthwhile.
Here in Beijing my 3 children attend a very unique school, Beijing City International School. What makes this school unique is that it is the only international school that is Chinese owned. This means that Chinese passport holders, i.e. local Chinese with the financial means, can attend this school. So we have many parents at the school who are Beijing ren (local Beijingers) or Chinese nationals. There are many Children, born to Chinese nationals, who were born abroad, in the US, Europe or elsewhere who hold those other country passports and they cannot hold a Chinese passport and their parents cannot hold dual passports. One of the benefits of this is that their children can then go to the other international schools because they are foreign passport holders. At our school Chinese passport holders can attend. This means that I know a lot of Chinese parents and they have specifically chosen this school because they want their children to be exposed to more variety and a different style of learning than they themselves experienced in the Chinese system. At the international day music show it was fabulous to see so many children of every nationality showing their talents. Yes there were piano and violin players but there were also drummers and guitar players and rappers, rock singers etc. and I was really inspired by this because it showed a willingness on behalf of many of those Chinese parents to allow their children to explore their creativity and to express it in many different ways.
Since being here I have not seen any difference to what I experienced in the UK in terms of variety of parenting styles and approaches in terms of extra curricular activities, extra tutoring etc. You have some parents who schedule their children’s every hour and have extra tutoring for various subjects and parents who don’t and every level in between.
I teach a class called Parent Effectiveness Training and the similarity between both Chinese and Western parents who take this course is that all of them want to have positive family relationships that are based on a mutual respect for each other. Amy’s book definitely made for great reading but I found myself feeling very sad that Amy missed out on many opportunities to really listen to and get to know her children. When she finally did, after the horrible incident in Russia when Lulu finally made herself heard by having an outburst and breaking the glass in the middle of the restaurant, Amy was inspired to write this book.
I definitely give Amy credit for her honesty in writing this book. I will forward this blog to my friends here in Beijing Meghan so that you can get some additional perspectives. I think the fact that one of China’s areas for future development is in creating more schools that will foster more innovative and independent thinkers. Beijing City International School was recently featured on a CCTV show as an example of the type of school that China needs more of. So there is a shift, not only in schooling but also in parenting styles in China to create more independent thinking something I did not feel Amy Chua’s style allowed.
Hello Meghan,
I am an American friend of Heidi’s living in Beijing. Our family has been here for 2.5 years and my children in grades 7 and 9 also attend Beijing City International school. I read Amy Chua’s book last year.
I agree with all that Heidi said. There are parents back in my home town of Seattle that have the same types of ambitions for their children as the Tiger Mom. I would, however, say that the percentage of these parents is much, much greater in Chinese families. This was the case with many Chinese families in Seattle as well.
My worry for the kids of Tiger parents is that they are held up to a standard that many of them will not achieve. Only so many high school graduates are going to make it to Harvard. There are 1.3 billion Chinese in China. The kids have these high and possibly unrealistic expectations thrust upon them and if they don’t make it they may feel like failures and disappointments to their parents. I believe a lot of Chinese people go through their lives feeling this way.
The one thing that did resonate with me from the book was the idea that if we don’t push our children to achieve the best they can we are doing them a disservice. I believe in encouragement and I don’t believe in quitting (without some serious thought). But I think a parent’s job is to help a child feel capable of doing anything, not to stand over them with a tire iron to force them to do things they may detest or have no interest in.
While it is wonderful to play the piano or violin at an expert level and to achieve straight A’s, why not encourage children to think outside the box? We have always given our kids exposure to many disciplines and hobbies and they have become well rounded people interested in many things. It takes all kinds to make a vibrant world.
Hi Meg,
I’m Heidi’s friend – Sharon.
I thought I would attempt to answer these two questions you raised from my own perspective- “I wonder if she has met any Tiger mothers? Has her parenting style and the way she raises her children been influenced by other mothers and families in China?”
1) Meeting tiger moms (and living to tell the tale)
Since becoming a parent, I have had a few sightings of tiger mothers. In my small and mostly unrepresentative sample size, the stereotype of Asian Tiger Mothers seems correct. However there is a certain tiggery quality apparent in some English circles, in registering their offspring at birth in their alma mater (i.e some overpriced English public school).
Many of them gave up high flying careers in law, investment banking or managment consulting to be full-time parents. The children they raise seem equally consistent with the stereotype- play classical musical instruments, do a lot of maths, and read in two to three languages by the time they are in first grade.
Since tiger parenthood seems to presume a certain level of wealth, many of these parents have ivy league aspirations for their children. MIT and Harvard are prefered. Oxbridge is fine as well. London universities are considered an acceptable back up choice on the UCAS form. As for Chinese universities, to say that competition to get into Peking University or Tsinghua or Fudan is a little intense is like saying that the Prince of Wales is a little posh.
I know many Chinese parents willing to do all kinds of things in order to get all kinds of priviledges for their kids, ranging from paying an arm and leg for (school) teachers to tutor their kids outside of school hours in the hope that the teachers might impart useful information about the exams, to outright bribery. It’s the Confucian-style education system without the confucian ethics meeting market economy. Not a good combination to say the least.
2) Has it influenced my parenting style?
Probably more than I like to admit. It principally strikes me with a quesy mix of both horror and fear.
Horror because I get the sense as if their children have become projects with Key Performance Indicators and Target Milestones that must be reached, instead of simply children that need breathing space to play.
Fear which can only come from the gnawing insecurity and self-doubt at the back of just about every parent’s mind – Am I correct in the (admittedly less-tigerish) way I am raising my kids? What if the real reason my children are not doing all these things is because I am lazy and complacent? What if my children could be proud alumni of Balliol college if only I had just made them a few flash cards at three months old?
So I do make several half-hearted attempts to do some sight words and play the piano a couple of times with my children. Probably each time I meet a Tiger Parent (dads count too) it reminds me that I probably could spend more academic quality time with the kids that doesn’t involve letting them play with legos whilst I am reading Hunger Games.
Thank you all for your comments. Heidi, that is spooky timing! I had no idea you were reading Amy’s book!
Great to hear from you Park and Sharon and thanks for sharing your stories. I look forward to reading more comments from other parents as well. Sharon you made a good point – there are tiger fathers too!
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 with this-or-that shortcoming. We all have our closets with doors that are not always fully opened.
And why all this Chinese obsession unthinkingly dumped on violin and piano? What do the parents with such insistence know of violin and piano repertoire? Further, what do they know of the great body of literature for flute? For French horn? For organ? For trumpet? Usually, nothing!
For pressure-driven (not professionally-driven!) parents like Amy Chua their children, with few exceptions, will remain little more than mechanical sidebars to the core of classical music as it’s practiced by musicians with a humanistic foundation.
Professor Chua better be socking away a hefty psychoreserve fund in preparation for the care and feeding of her two little lambs once it becomes clear to them both just how empty and ill-defined with pseudo-thorough grounding their emphasis has been on so-called achievement.
Read more about this widespread, continuing problem in Forbidden Childhood (N.Y., 1957) by Ruth Slenczynska.
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André M. Smith, Bach Mus, Mas Sci (Juilliard)
Diploma (Lenox Hill Hospital School of Respiratory Therapy)
Postgraduate studies in Human and Comparative Anatomy (Columbia University)
Formerly Bass Trombonist
The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra of New York,
Leopold Stokowski’s American Symphony Orchestra (Carnegie Hall),
The Juilliard Orchestra, Aspen Festival Orchestra, etc.