House On Mango Street

“The House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros is a beautifully constructed piece of literature. It has a lot of elements to it with it has layers and layers of meaning. For this reason, I really enjoyed it, and would recommend it. As someone who believes in the rights of people, and is a feminist, this book truly captured the essence of the border between us and them that exists at the basis of many social issues and movements. This is the border between races, genders, and people. The discussion of the border is my favorite part of this book because it opens people’s minds to the possibility that they may have predetermined labels about people based off of culture and society. People define other people by their race, gender, sexuality, or any possible label they can assign them, and Cisneros is able to capture this and put into writing how this distinctions can cause harm. For example, Cisneros’ main character thinks that “the Chinese, like the Mexicans, [do not] like their women strong” (10). This not only shows Cisneros’ discussion of cultural prejudices, but how she also uses this culture to show an overall oppression of women.

An employee at Esperanza’s first job “[asks] if [she knows] what day it [is]... he [says] it [is] his birthday and would [she] please give him a birthday kiss. [Esperanza thinks she will] because he [is] so old and just as [she is] about to put [her] lips on his cheek, he grabs [her] face with both hands and kisses [her] hard on the mouth and [does not] let go” (55). This harassment of women is a common theme throughout Cisneros’ book, and leaves me questioning how things like this are continuingly allowed in today’s