Back in Esperanza's time and community, women were treated as if they were objects, having attracting boys, marrying young, giving herself away to a husband as the goal of a girl's life. As years slip by, most women just sit next to a window and stare at the outside with eyes full of sadness, imagining a life with freedom and independent will. Nevertheless, they can only dreams of those fantasies, while staring into the nothingness of the walls at home. In the novel The House on Mango Street, we viewed this man-dominate society from the eyes of a young girl, Esperanza, who was expected to be the same housewives that most other Mexican women in her community are. Using simple words and vignettes, Esperanza showed us her keen observations of the struggles of the woman on Mango Street due to their culture …show more content…
Each of them wish of a better change in life that a man and marriage will bring to them. Sally, Esperanza’s classmate and friend, dresses appealing and draws the attention of all the boys. Esperanza admires her beauty and also wants the boys to notice her. “Sally, who taught you to paint your eyes like Cleopatra? And if I roll the little brush with my tongue and chew it to a point and dip it in the muddy cake, the one in the little red box, will you teach me?”
Marin, another young girl of Esperanza’s neighborhood, is deeply restricted by her culture both mentally and physically. She has an unemployed boyfriend back in her home country, Puerto Rico, and she is saving money to go back and marry him. Also, Marin talks about getting a job in order to dress up beautifully, and meet someone who will marry her and provide for her a comfortable life. "Marin... Is waiting for a car to stop, a star to fall, someone to change her life." Her experiences expresses the culture emphasis on how much women thought they needed men and depended on
Esperanza is a young girl who struggles with feelings of loneliness and feeling that she doesn’t fit in because she is poor. She always wanted to fit in with the other kids and feel like she was one of them. She loves to write because it helps her feel better about herself writing about her life and her community. Writing helps her with
“The House on Mango Street” emphasizes on this issue, even broadens to explain other controversial matters such as abuse, misogynistic views, and stereotypes. The protagonist, Esperanza Cordero moves to Mango Street where she must witness the abuse affecting her friends, neighbors, and family. Either Sally a close friend, Mamacita a neighbor, or her own mother handling 4 children. Over the course of the novel Esperanza changes physically and mentally. Through the use of imagery as well as complex, descriptive vignettes Cisneros epitomizes the misogynistic views within Esperanza’s
Esperanza was able to provide the audience with an image that was vivid of her surroundings through her diction and tone. Esperanza presents a series of stories that she deals with in her neighborhood as she grows up. Esperanza arose from poverty and always dreamt of having a house of her own. Sandra Cisneros' strong cultural and gender values have a tremendous influence on The House on Mango Street. Cisneros feels that the Mexican-American community is very abusive towards the treatment of women because men are seen as the powerful, strong figure.
Women’s Escape into Misery Women’s need for male support and their husband’s constant degradation of them was a recurring theme in the book House on Mango Street. Many of Esperanza’s stories were about women’s dreams of marrying, the perfect husband and having the perfect family and home. Sally, Rafaela, and Minerva are women who gave me the impression of [damsel’s in distress].CLICHÉ, it’s ok though. It’s relevant They wished for a man to sweep them of their feet and rescue them from their present misery. These characters are inspiring and strong but they are unable to escape the repression of the surrounding environment. *Cisneros presents a rigid world in which they lived in, and left them no other hope but to get married. Esperanza, however, is a very tough girl who knows what she wants. She will keep dreaming and striving until she gets it. She says, "I am too strong for her [Mango Street] to keep me here" (110). Esperanza learned from all of these women that she was not going to be tied down. She said, "I have decided not to grow up tame like the others who lay their necks on the threshold waiting for the ball and chain" (88). **Especially after seeing that Sally was suffering so much. Sally’s father is making her want to leave home by beating her. Sally "said her mother rubs lard on the places were it hurts" (93). There is not enough lard in the world to be able to cure the pain within Sally’s heart. Sally, "met a marshmallow salesman at a school bazaar" (101). Pretty soon " sally got married, she has her house now, her pillowcases and her plates" (101). Her marriage seems to free her from her father, but in reality she has now stepped into a world of misery. This was supposed to help her heal; " she says she is in love, but I think she did it to escape." (101). Unlike the other women Sally has no escape, no poetry, not even papaya coconut juice, not to mention, " he does not let her look out the window" (102). That is why "she sits at home because she is afraid to go outside without his permission."(102). Rafaela’s situation also involves imprisonment in her own home. Cisneros introduced us to Rafaela, a young beautiful girl whose expectations from marriage were to obtain a sweet home to live in. Instead...
In the society that Esperanza and her friends live in, love takes a back seat
“Someday, I will have a best friend all my own. One I can tell my secrets to. One who will understand my jokes without me having to explain them” (9). These are the longing words spoken by Esperanza. In the novel The House on Mango Street, Esperanza is young girl experiencing adolescence not only longing for a place to fit in but also wanting to be beautiful. This becomes complicated as Esperanza becomes more sexually aware. Throughout the novel, Cisneros argues the importance of beauty and how Esperanza deals with beauty as a part of her identity. When Esperanza meets Sally a new friend, Esperanza’s whole world is turned upside down. Esperanza’s views on beauty change from a positive outlook to a negative one by watching how beauty has damaged Sally’s life.
In the book House On Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, Esperanza tries to defy women’s gender roles while others blindly follow them, or give into them. Many chapters in the book are about gender roles like “No Speak English” or “Linoleum Roses.” but one that stuck out to me is “Alesia Who See’s Mice.” After Alicia’s mother died, her father was depending on Alesia to spend the rest of her life behind a rolling pin, or in a factory, but she wants to go to college. She is defying her gender roles by studying for college but she is also forced to wake up early and make lunch for her working dad. So in some ways she is defying gender roles but she is also giving into them because she has to get up early to cook. “Two trains and a bus, because she doesn't want to spend her entire life behind a rolling pin.”(31-32). Esperanza is narrating how Alesia is constantly moving around from university to house to factory. So Alesia is doing her best to defy gender roles.
The House on Mango Street is the tale about a young girl named Esperanza who is maturing throughout the text. In it Esperanza documents the events and people who make up Mango Street. It is through this community that Esperanza’s ideas and concepts of the relationships between men and women are shaped. She provides detailed accounts about the oppression of women at not only the hands of men who make up Mango Street but also how the community contributes to this oppression. As the young girls and women of Mango Street try to navigate the world they must deal with a patriarchal society that seeks to keep them confined. By growing up in this environment where women are confined Esperanza seeks desperately to depart from Mango Street for fear
Esperanza, the main character of The House on Mango Street, a novella written by Sandra Cisneros in 1984, has always felt like she didn’t belong. Esperanza sought a different life than the ones that people around her were living. She wanted to be in control of her life, and not be taken away by men as so many others around her had. Esperanza wanted to move away from Mango Street and find the house, and life she had always looked for. Through the use of repetition, Sandra Cisneros conveys a sense of not belonging, that can make a person strong enough to aspire to a better life.
Sandra Cisneros’s novella The House on Mango Street showcases women who are forced to fulfill the typical 1980s’ Mexican female role; as a result, they endure physical harm and sexual assault, which prohibit them from leaving their neighborhood to pursue their goals independently. In the first instance, Esperanza describes her great-grandmother as “a wild horse of a woman” (Cisneros 11); however, as Esperanza further explains, her soon-to-be great-grandfather forces the “wild horse” (11) to marry. Specifically, Esperanza’s great-grandfather “thr[ows] a sack over her head and carrie[s] her off” (11), and thus he tames the wild horse; because of his actions, Esperanza’s great-grandmother is forced to “look out the window her whole life” (11).
Esperanza grew up very wealthy in a big house with servants. She was spoiled and never had to lift a finger. She had a close relationship with her father. Esperanza had a collection of dolls he would give her every year on her birthday. Esperanza had everything she could wish for. Everything was in order like her dolls lined up on her dresser. Then tragedy hit when Esperanza’s father died. His death affected everyone, especially Esperanza. Life
Esperanza, a strong- willed girl who dreams big despite her surroundings and restrictions, is the main character in The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros. Esperanza represents the females of her poor and impoverished neighborhood who wish to change and better themselves. She desires both sexuality and autonomy of marriage, hoping to break the typical life cycle of woman in her family and neighborhood. Throughout the novel, she goes through many different changes in search of identity and maturity, seeking self-reliance and interdependence, through insecure ideas such as owning her own house, instead of seeking comfort and in one’s self. Esperanza matures as she begins to see the difference. She evolves from an insecure girl to a mature young lady through her difficult life experiences and the people she comes across. It is through personal encounters and experiences that Esperanza begins to become sexually aware and acceptance her place and self-definition in her community.
She was not a master of style, plot development or characterization, but the intensity of feeling and aspiration are evident in her narratives that overrides her imperfections. Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street, written in 1984, and Anzia Yezierska’s Bread Givers, published in 1925, are both aimed at adolescent and adult audiences that deal with deeply disturbing themes about serious social conditions and their effects on children as adults. Both books are told in the first person; both narrators are young girls living in destitute neighborhoods; and both young girls witness the harsh realities of life for those who are poor, abused, and hopeless. Although the narrators face these overwhelming obstacles, they manage to survive their tough environments with their wits and strength remaining intact. Esperanza, a Chicano with three sisters and one brother, has had a dream of having her own things since she was ten years old.
Throughout The House on Mango Street Esperanza learns to resist the gender norms that are deeply imbedded in her community. The majority of the other female characters in the novel have internalized the male viewpoint and they believe that it is their husbands or fathers responsibility to care for them and make any crucial decisions for them. However, despite the influence of other female characters that are “immasculated”, according to Judith Fetterley, Esperanza’s experiences lead her to become a “resisting reader” in Fettereley’s terminology because she does not want to become like the women that she observes, stuck under a man’s authority. She desires to leave Mango Street and have a “home of her own” so that she will never be forced to depend on a man (Cisneros 108). During the course of the novel Esperanza eventually realizes that it is also her duty to go back to Mango Street “For the ones that cannot out”, or the women who do not challenge the norms (110). Esperanza eventually turns to her writing as a way to escape from her situation without having to marry a man that she would be forced to rely on like some of her friends do.
In the Book women are looked upon as objects by men whether they are boyfriends, friends fathers or husbands. The girls in the novel grow up with the mentality that looks and appearance are the most important things to a woman. Cisneros also shows how Latino women are expected to be loyal to their husbands, and that a husband should have complete control of the relationship. Yet on the other hand, Cisneros describes the character Esperanza as being different. Even though she is born and raised in the same culture as the women around her, she is not happy with it, and knows that someday she will break free from its ties, because she is mentally strong and has a talent for telling stories. She comes back through her stories by showing the women that they can be independent and live their own lives. In a way this is Cinceros' way of coming back and giving back to the women in her community.