Identity In The House On Mango Street By Sandra Cisneros

905 Words2 Pages

Identities can be stolen, lost, forgotten, but most importantly, they can be found. In the novella, The House On Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros portrays a girl who does not know her identity. Esperanza is living in a very impovershed part of her city, and this gives her a very negative outlook on her life and her surroundings. This negative outlook causes her to reject her own identity and who she is. Esperanza’s negative view of herself slowly changes, though, as she begins to focus on her larger community and her place within it. Hroug this, Cisneros shows that knowing and accepting where one comes from is an important part of growing up and determining one’s identity. Her name was one of the main reasons she rejected her identity. She did not want to end up like her grandmother, who she was …show more content…

She does not let it define her, instead she learns from it. She talks about her future and mentions that she will let bums live in her attic. She states, “People who live on hills sleep so close to the stars they forget those of us who live too much on earth. They don't look down at all except to be content to live on hills. They have nothing to do with last week's garbage or fear of rats. Night comes. Nothing wakes them but the wind...Rats? they'll ask. Bums, I'll say, and I'll be happy”(Cisneros 86) This shows that she remembers her past and being impoverished. Instead of letting this get to her, she remembers it and lets it mold her into a more caring person. She relates to these people and because of this, she lets them stay in her attic. She smiles because she knows she is doing a good thing that nobody ever did for her or her family. Her accepting her past shows her maturity and it made her into a more caring person. She found her role in the community and it changed her very negative point of view. She turned her negative, cynical, and impoverished view into that of a caring, happy

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