The symbol found in Sally’s story is shoes, which represents the sense of sexuality and adult femininity. It also symbolizes Esperanza’s sexuality and her inner conflict of her feeling between her emerging sexual attractiveness and her desire for independence. When Esperanza wants to be friend with Sally, who is sexually mature, she describes Sally’s black suede shoes and wonders if she can convince her mother to buy her a similar pair. When Sally abandons Esperanza in the monkey garden in order to fool around with boys, Esperanza thinks her own feet look foreign. Finally, in Esperanza’s vision of her dream house, her shoes are placed beside the bed, suggesting that she has or will have some control over her own sexuality, only in her imagination.
The next character is Rafaela, Esperanza’s neighbor who lives on the upper floor. She is locked up in the room by her husband for she is so beautiful that her husband is afraid she would run away. She always leans on the window, listens to the music from the bar around the corner wishing she could go there and dance. This shows that Rafaela longs for the freedom she will never get. From time to time she asks the Esperanza to buy coconut or papaya juice for her by throwing a dollar bill down and then bringing the juice up by using a paper bag and a cloth lines. Rafaela represents the possible fate of what could become on Mango Street. Rafaela is forced to abandon her own dreams because of her husband. The only slight freedom she has is when she daydreams by the window listening to the music. Rafaela is stuck in the oppressive relationship, where her husband is in complete control, because she is only familiar with this kind of relationship. Therefore, no matter what, Rafaela is always tie...
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...arly, they all perceive writing as a way to escape from reality, as well as a way to express themselves, their dreams, and wishes.
In conclusion, “The House on Mango Street” manifests the differences between men’s and women’s roles in Mexican culture through Esperanza’s point of view. All of the female characters mentioned in the story are oppressed and overpowered by men, whether husbands, fathers, or even children. The story is both astounding and emotional, as it astonishingly reveals Esperanza’s process of growing up by observing and learning the valuable life lessons from her female neighbors. These women are portrayed as a negative role model for Esperanza. Unfortunately, most of them offer her the examples of a person she does not want to become. Yet, these women teach Esperanza many life experiences and have an important role in shaping her identity as well.
Throughout The House On Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, many symbols, themes, and motifs appear while analysing the story of Esperanza growing up on Mango Street, a poor neighborhood. Symbols are a very big part of this book, because without deeper consideration of the text, this book would just be a series of dull, unrelated stories. One of the most prominent symbols in this story is the symbol of shoes representing our main character, Esperanza, maturing and adjusting into womanhood and her sexuality.
In the story the house on mango street there are both young girls, Sally and Esperanza. Both girls desire adventure, love, and beauty. However, Sally is more outgoing and confident than Esperanza. She has confidence that she is beautiful. She play the role of a strong female that never get hurt by any boys. Esperanza admires and looks up to Sally. Esperanza does not want to be a "weak woman" and she sees Sally as her role model. Their home lives contrast also Ironically. Sally is physically abused by her father each time he catches her with a boy. On the other side Esperanza and her family communicates well. Sally sees her self as a women and not the type of women a person that isn't confident of herself and that's what Esperanza likes.
Esperanza sees all of the women around her, and most of them are the same. The overall idea of the women on Mango Street is they are property to their husbands. They cannot do anything unless their husbands allow them to. It also starts out at a young age. The young girls like Esperanza see the women that live around them and think that is the way to live. They admire them so they start to mature faster than they should. Sally is one of them. Sally loves the attention that she gets from boys, but her father does not like that. Sally grew up and got married at a young age.
“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
Symbolism is the key to understanding Sandra Cisneros’ novel, “The House on Mango Street”. By unraveling the symbolism, the reader truly exposes the role of not only Latina women but women of any background. Esperanza, a girl from a Mexican background living in Chicago, writes down what she witnesses while growing up. As a result of her sheltered upbringing, Esperanza hardly comprehends the actions that take place around her, but what she did understand she wrote in her journal. Cisneros used this technique of the point of view of a child, to her advantage by giving the readers enough information of what is taking place on Mango Street so that they can gather the pieces of the puzzle a get the big picture.
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.
In The House on Mango Street, Cisneroz agitates the theme of diversity through her use of characters and setting. Cisneroz paints a multitude of events that follow a young girl named Esperanza growing up in the diverse section of Chicago. She is dealing with searching for a release from the low expectations that the Latino communities often put women whether young or old are put against. Cisneroz often draws from her life growing up that she was able to base Esperanza's life experiences on and portray an accurate view on Latino societies today. Cisneroz used the chapter “Boys and Girls” and “Beautiful and cruel” to portray Esperanzas growth from a young curious girl to a wise woman. She came into her own personal awareness and her actions that she has to now be held accountable for.
One recurring theme in the House on Mango Street is independence. In the novel, Esperanza dreams of the day she will leave Mango Street and the oppression from men, to become truly free. However, as she matures, she begins to desire love from men. In the vignette, “Beautiful and Cruel”, Esperanza describes her admiration for the women in the movies who are beautiful, desired my men, yet retain their own power. Sally Rafaela is an important character because she teaches Esperanza that such a dream is an insurmountable challenge. At first glance Sally Rafaela embodies the traits of the movie heroines; she is gorgeous, dresses nicely, and has the attention of the boys, but as we dive deeper into her life, we discover that she is not free. Scared that Sally will run away, her abusive father dominates her life by constant and savage beatings over miniscule issues.
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.
“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.
Rafaela is married to an older man and “gets locked indoors because her husband is afraid Rafaela will run away since she is too beautiful to look at” (79). The narrator Esperanza notes that because Rafaela is locked in the house she gives the passing kids money to run to the store to bring her back juice. Esperanza states that “Rafaela who drinks and drinks coconut and papaya juice on Tuesdays and wishes there were sweeter drinks, not bitter like an empty room, but sweet sweet like the island, like the dance hall down the street where women much older than her throw green eyes easily like dice and open homes with keys. And always there is someone offering sweeter drinks, someone promising to keep them on a silver string” (81). Esperanza is being to notice a common occurrence in the treatment of women on Mango Street. Rafaela is locked away by her husband as he wants to keep her from running off. This mirrors the relationship between Earl and his wife. Rafaela is described in more detail however allowing readers a deeper connection to her experience in her marriage. Esperanza witnesses Rafaela’s confinement in the house each time she passes by with friends and Rafaela sends them down money to buy her a drink from the store since she is unable to go herself. There is also an interesting comparison in which the confined room is compared to being bitter whereas the sweet drink is compared to being the
She seems intelligent, ambitious, and spirited but her characteristics is diminished by her husband. The vignette “Rafaela Who Drinks Coconut & Papaya Juice on Tuesdays” is almost like a fairy tale because her husband keeps her confined and her only connection to the outside world is sitting by the open window like many other the other women on Mango Street. Her only escape is to communicate with the children outside to get her drinks by lowering a bag by string. As Rafaela drinks her drink she fantasies how life will be to be living freely as other people, “Rafaela who drinks and drinks coconut and papaya juice on Tuesdays and wishes there were sweeter drinks, not bitter like an empty room but sweet like the island” (Cisneros 80). Exactly why she stays with her husband, but she lives in misery, because it seems the reason she stays purely she cannot visualize living in any other way, regardless of her dreams. The devotion maybe the fear stops her from grasping her
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.
The vignette “beautiful and Cruel” from The House On Mango street by Sandra Cisneros, helps the reader to visualize the personality of Esperanza as an independent thinking and non conformist girl, “ugly girl” (88), using figurative language, imagery and, descriptive language. Esperanza has an inner conflict thinking about her future role, she "decides not to grow up tame like the others who lay their necks on the threshold waiting for the ball and chain" (88). In the words “waiting for the ball and chain” the author makes Esperanza use figurative language in order to highlight her frustration and her independent personality viewing the world differently from others. Esperanza rejects the idea of being feminine and beautiful. Her mother told
that marrying young is considered the norm, and young girls are taught to become subservient to men and accept losing a chance to control their future in the process. She sees that the effect of young marriage on Mango Street leads to oppressed relationships and lost futures. After observing Marin, Minerva and Sally waiting for someone to change their lives, Esperanza understands the stereotype Mango Street has created that influences young girls to marry young usually results in an oppressed, unsatisfied life and a fixed future. Esperanza now knows that in order to escape from Mango Street she has to follow her passion of writing and advance her education to support herself instead of becoming male reliant. Girls on Mango Street are influenced from a young age to aspire to young marriage and kids and to accept male dominance in a relationship, even if it means becoming oppressed resulting in low self-esteem or reliant on men to change their futures. Each person is born with the power to make a future for themselves and control their emotions and lives. If girls give men that power they are essentially handing over their lives on a silver platter, leaving the men with the ability to control them. If girls, like Esperanza, do not allow men take their power of independence, ambition, and confidence they can prevent the taking of their futures and create an independent life for