Review on Reconciling Cultural Differences
The chapter is divided into 7 sub chapter, starts from One until Seven. The middle chapter from this novel tells the memoir written by LuLing. It tells the past
life of LuLing when she was in China. This section reveals the sad story of LuLing, her mother, her Chinese family, and the reason she moves to America.
The third chapter focuses more on Ruth ’s perspective after she knows about her
mother’s story. Amy Tan’s work is known with its story about the relationship between
mother and daughter. Like Tan’s previous work, The Bonesetter’s Daughter also deals with mother-daughter relationship and its conflict in culture. The differences
in American and Chinese culture create conflicts to Ruth Young as a modern woman who grows up with American culture and her conservative mother with
her strong Chinese belief. Later on, after Ruth knows the story of her mother’s past life, she knows how to react toward the culture.
B.
Approach of the Study
The approach that is used in this study is the sociocultural-historical approach. Rohrberger and Woods in Reading and Writing About Literature state
that Critics whose major interest is the sociocultural-historical approach insist
that the only way to locate the real work is in reference to the civilization that produced it. They define civilization as the attitude and actions of a
specific group of people and point out that literature takes these attitudes and actions as its subject matter Rohrberger and Woods, 1971: 9.
The citation from Rohrberger and Woods emphasizes that sociocultural- historical is the approach that can be used by the researchers who study in the
field of social and cultural context and historical aspect. The researchers can rely on this approach since it is the appropriate one that can locate and relate the
references from the civilization in the real world. According to Rohbreger and Woods, “No one, of course, can deny their
assertions, first, that literature is not created in a vacuum, and second, that literature embodies ideas significant to the
culture that produced it” Rohbreger and Woods, 1971: 9. The culture in the reality turns into background knowledge
of the author in producing literary work. The researchers can use the approach to analyze a literary work that uses the references in social, cultural and historical
aspects and covers the story with those aspects. The writer chooses this approach to analyze
The Bonesetter’s Daughter. The novel itself is constructed by the social structure in society, surrounded by the
cross cultural conflicts and told about the cultures and histories. The approach is used in order to analyze deeper the cultural conflicts because of the cultural
differences that are faced by Ruth as second generation who learns about American values. The approach also helps the writer to see the reaction of Ruth
Young after knowing the social, cultural and historical context of her immigrant mother.