ipl-logo

Gender Roles In The House On Mango Street

634 Words3 Pages

In many communities, gender roles are prominent everywhere you go. In The House on Mango Street, a novel by Sandra Cisneros, Esperanza sees this daily. When she's out of the house and in public, her brothers won’t come near her. One of the girls on her street is following some of the stereotypes about how the man comes and “saves” the woman and provides for her. This goes along with a woman whose husband will not let her out since he is scared she will run away. The community around Esperanza has many gender roles that separate the boys and girls, which makes her want to break these roles and be her own, independent, person.
In the vignette “Boys and Girls” Esperanza sees that gender roles are prominent around her neighborhood and school. Esperanza’s brothers, who she always talked to at home, “But outside they can not be seen talking to girls. Carlos and Kiki are each other's best friend, not ours”(Cisneros 8). Which made her feel like she only could be around girls, not boys. This makes her feel like she needs to take care of Nenny since she is an older sister and are not close enough in age to be friends. Since she can’t be around her brothers, this makes Esperanza want to have her own friend that she can be with. She never thought about how these gender roles are not equitable and did not know how they would affect her. …show more content…

While Marin waits for a guy to come and give her everything, she “Is waiting for a car to stop, a star to fall, someone to changeher life”(Cisneros 27). This affects Esperanza by making her feel like all of the other girls want to do the same but she does not want to. She does not want to wait for a man to come and provide for her, she wants to provide for herself and be her own independent person when she grows up. Esperanza does not want to be locked into one place in a

Show More
Related

The House On Mango Street Sacrifice Essay

732 Words | 3 Pages

Although there are a variety of characters throughout literature that have made sacrifices that expose their values, none of them come close in comparison to the sacrifices of Esperanza in Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street. The consistent sacrifices displayed through Esperanza’s self-image, innocence, and cynicism express the struggles and desire for feminine individuality and respect that begin for many in childhood and dissolve into adulthood. Not only does Esperanza display these sacrifices constantly throughout the novel, the author’s use of her character as a beacon of catharsis to the reader symbolically represents the majority of women. Much like other women, Esperanza constantly tries to find herself throughout her own sacrifices,

Read More

Change In Esperanza's The House On Mango Street

1095 Words | 5 Pages

However, Esperanza’s negative view of herself slowly changes as she begins to focus on her larger community and her place within it. Through this, Cisneros shows that knowing and accepting where we have come from is an important part of growing up and determining who we are. In the beginning of

Read More

The Window In Esperanza's The House On Mango Street

1445 Words | 6 Pages

Still Esperanza does not get what is going on at this point. She is still so naïve and innocent. Sometimes the reader forgets how young she actually is because of the things she is going through at such a young age. Her mind and her decisions are moving at a faster pace, but she is still so blind to the world.

Read More

The House On Mango Street Figurative Language

684 Words | 3 Pages

How would you feel when you grew to realize the street you were raised on wasn’t good for your wellbeing and that you needed to get away? Well, ‘The House on Mango Street, written by Sandra Cisneros is a story about Esperanza’s childhood growing up in Chicago and how she develops as she gets older throughout the book. She realizes throughout the book that she didn’t belong on Mango Street. It takes whomever is reading it on an adventure through Esperanza’s point of view on her life. The book shows an overview of her childhood through several small short stories put together.

Read More

Freedom In The House On Mango Street

772 Words | 4 Pages

Sandra Cisneros, the author of the book The House on the Mango Street, conveys that girls or women do not have as much freedom as guys do, the girls or women are always ruled or controlled by someone mostly male, and they always have to be the one to follow the rules. As Esperanza grows up she observes many girls who are in the conditions that they are not supposed to be in. The girls have no freedom and they are always supposed to listen to the guy in the family. One observation Esperanza observes is that girls are controlled by men all the time and because of listening to men those girls are locked inside. For example as Esperanza says, “And then Rafaela, who is still young but getting old from leaning out the window so much, gets locked indoors because her husband is afraid Rafaela will run away since she is too beautiful to look at” ( Cisneros # 79 ).

Read More

The House On Mango Street Adulthood Analysis

1212 Words | 5 Pages

She wants to overcome her childish tendencies and transition into womanhood. When Esperanza sees Sire’s girlfriend her interest in Sire and his relationship increases. She even begins to imagine what it would feel like to have a boyfriend. “I want to sit bad at night, a boy around my neck and the wind under my skirt” (73). This represents the arrival of puberty, which is demonstrated by Esperanza’s desire to behave in a grown-up way.

Read More

The House On Mango Street Gender Roles

707 Words | 3 Pages

Throughout the story, Esperanza witnesses the prevalence of gender roles in her community and the domestic responsibilities that fall on women's shoulders. Sandra Cisneros presents insights into women's actualities by showing the emotional and physical

Read More

Gender Roles In The House On Mango Street

1476 Words | 6 Pages

In Mexican American society , women are deemed inferior to men, evident in traditional family roles, the male is the head of the family who provides for the family , while the woman stays at home to look after the children she is expected to provide for her husband . In the third vignette of ‘The House on Mango Street’ titled ‘Boys and Girls’ the reader is informed of the division between men and women when Esperanza refers to herself and her sister Nenny , and her brothers, “They’ve got plenty to say to me and Nenny inside the house. But outside they can’t be seen talking to girls”. The male dominance begins at a very young age.

Read More

Sexism In The House On Mango Street

1204 Words | 5 Pages

These problems coming to light through the many women Esperanza looks up to, drive her to rise above her obstacles, and become more than just another poorly treated woman. Despite the variety of girls in the neighborhood, one of Esperanza’s closest friends ends up being Sally, who has moved from one abusive home to the next. Sally’s father was a very strict man and she constantly disobeyed him once out of his sight. Whenever Sally is caught dressing “provocative” or acting “too old” her father decides to teach her a lesson.

Read More

Female Role Models In Mango Street

910 Words | 4 Pages

Growing up as a young female teen came be hard due to the stress and peer pressure of appearance. For teenage girls from immigrant families, it came be very challenging to fit in with the “American way”. Esperanza struggles throughout the book with finding her place in society. She looks to other female role models in her community for guidance, where she finds different results. Most of Esperanza’s female role models on Mango Street have unique stories to tell of their experiences with men on Mango Street.

Read More

The House On Mango Street: Isolation, Limitation, Expectation

896 Words | 4 Pages

Prajwal Agrawal Ms. Banack English 1A, Period 5 21 MAR 2023 Isolation, Limitation, Expectation Throughout history, women have been continuously bound by the expectations of society. In socioeconomically disadvantaged communities, such as the one presented in Sandra Cisneros’s novella The House on Mango Street, women are further confined to their monotonous futures in the household to which they have been chained. Cisneros uses the abuse cycle, objectification, and gender expectations to display the patriarchy's limits on the potential of women on Mango Street.

Read More

Reoccurring Themes

592 Words | 3 Pages

However, upon entering a laundromat, they receive sexual comments from men who call them names like "pretty girl" and offer them money in exchange for a kiss. This behavior deeply disturbs Esperanza and her cousins, highlighting the idea that some men view themselves as superior to women and feel entitled to degrade and harass them. Another example of this behavior can be seen in “Red Clowns.” Esperanza gets raped by a boy who insists on her kissing him and refers to her as “Spanish girl.” We can see that this situation incredibly troubles Esperanza to the point where she doesn’t even want to address it.

Read More

House On Mango Street Culture

437 Words | 2 Pages

The male-dominated society that Esperanza grows up in forces the idea that women are weak and should stay locked in their houses while men go off to work. The men are immoral and seedy, as expressed in the chapter in which a homeless man leers and asks for a kiss from the little girls. Esperanza experiences the evil of her community when she is sexually assaulted, causing her to lose her previous desire to explore her sexuality. Before being assaulted, she wanted to be “beautiful and cruel” like her friend Sally, because Sally was what she understood to be a perfect woman. However, after her rape she decides that she needs to discover her own identity for herself.

Read More

How Does Esperanza Show Otherness In The House On Mango Street

783 Words | 4 Pages

This experience for Esperanza changes her perspective of the thought of being othered. She realizes she is lonely, but she can make a difference on her own. Esperanza wants to face her own challenges and help other people

Read More

Societal Expectations In The House On Mango Street

575 Words | 3 Pages

Societal expectations are a part of everyone’s life, male or female. From the day people are born, there are roles they are expected to assume-- wife, homemaker, father, provider, mother and many others. While these aren’t necessarily negative, the stigma of not fulfilling these roles can be unpleasant. While the roles we are supposed to choose aren’t always clearly defined, the judgement that comes from choosing to take certain actions in life, like settling down or becoming a mother is palpable. Throughout The House on Mango Street, Esperanza’s view of the world is largely shaped by the people around her, which are her neighbors, family, and friends.

Read More

More about Gender Roles In The House On Mango Street

Related Topics

Open Document