Why did Kingstons mother cut her tongue?

Maxine Hong Kingston is the daughter of first-generation Chinese immigrants, therefore making her native language Chinese. When she was just a baby, her mother cut part of her tongue off "so that [Kingston] would not be tongue-tied. The story of what Kingston's mother did to her is how she begins her essay.

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How do you explain Kingston's urge to confess things to her mother?

Kingston decided to mimic the habit of confession that she had learned from her Mexican and Filipino Catholic friends, and tell her mother all the true things she had ever done or thought. Kingston picked a time of day when Brave Orchid was alone, and decided to tell her one thing per day. What did Maxine's mother demand from the drugstore after the delivery mistake? Kingston's mom told her that she cut her frenum (that connective part of the tongue) so she could speak more easily. Kingston remembers how her mom thought the drugstore delivery boy put a curse on their household by delivering the wrong medicine. She orders Kingston to go and reverse the curse.

What does ghost mean in The Woman Warrior?

Ghosts represent fear and the unknown in the novel. Ghosts could be the result of the sudden death that seizes newborn infants, or they could account for strange Americans and the machines that they operate. Can you eat straight A's? You can't eat straight A's" (46). Yet by adding that straight A's can't be eaten, Maxine admits that as long as she is a girl, her accomplishments, no matter how big or how fine, will never satisfy her parents.

Then, why was the woman warrior written?

While Kingston actually started this book prior to The Woman Warrior, Knopf did not publish it until 1980. China Men tells stories of Kingston's male ancestors. Kingston wrote this book to restore her Chinese family history and to take a new look at it in relation to American history.