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The House On Mango Street Essay

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The House on Mango Street is a novel by Sandra Cisneros that touches on subjects that the Latin community in America commonly faces. The story is told through short vignettes about the life of a young Mexican-American girl in a poor Chicago neighborhood during the 1960s. Despite themes of poverty and discrimination, The House on Mango Street shows that determination and resilience can lift people out of poverty. Cisneros describes the circumstances in which Esperanza's family lives and shows how people in Esperanza's situation may feel about it. At the beginning of the book, Esperanza is ashamed of her house. She describes how small the place is and beat-down lit looks; for example, in the first chapter, a nun from her school sees Esperanza's house and silently shames her. "I knew I had to have a house. A real house. One I could point to. But this isn't it. The house on Mango Street isn't." (Cisneros 5) Her interaction with the nun is her turning point in the book for leaving Mango Street. Because of the humiliation of showing her house, she decides that she will eventually get a house she is proud of and will not be ashamed of pointing out. …show more content…

In the chapter Those Who Don't, Cisneros describes how outsiders judge her community while driving through, "Those who don't know any better come into our neighborhood scared. They think we are dangerous"(Cisneros 28). Esperanza continues to describe people that outsiders judged simply for being Hispanic and living in a poor neighborhood. Sexist discrimination is seen in the chapter Beautiful and Cruel. It states that women are viewed solely on their looks when they grow up. Esperanza has also spoken in other chapters about how boys and girls receive different treatment. In Beautiful and Cruel, she decides not to conform to regular and unfair gender

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This shows that even though the community and neighborhood environment doesn't encourage women to get an education and for them just to be housewives. Esperanza's mom still supports women getting a good education and getting their own things in life. This quote shows that Esperanza's mom isn't affected by the community by motivating Esperanza to get an education and being self-reliant even though this isn't what most of the community believes. When Esperanza is thinking about how she wants to be in the future she says something about her little sister Nenny. The author states "Nenny says she won't wait her whole life for a husband to come and get her"(88).

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She is a Puerto Rican girl that wants “someone to change her life” and spends her days babysitting at her house (27). Esperanza gets the idea of marrying a rich man to get out of Mango Street. Marin also tells her about boys “is for the boys to see us and for us to see them” (27). These two ideas Marin shared with Esperanza shows how she can leave Mango Street and live a better life. To conclude, Sally, Mom, and Marin are the three most influential characters in the novel The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros for opening abusive relationships, staying in school for the better, and leaving poverty by marrying a rich man to the main character

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Esperanza and her family live in the house on Mango Street. Esperanza said, "The house on Mango Street is ours, and we don’t have to pay rent to anybody." (3) This quote shows that Esperanza and her family are proud to own a house of their own, but the reality of her situation is that she is still very poor and the house is not expensive to own. Towards the end of the book, Esperanza says, "Not a flat. Not an apartment in back.

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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.

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Esperanza and her family are always moving because they do not have much money, but they finally moved into a house on Mango Street where they “Don’t have to pay rent to anybody, or share the yard with the people downstairs, or be careful not to make too much noise” (703). Although it sounded like a nice place, when a nun from her school saw where Esperanza lived, she said, “You live there?” (703). That made Esperanza feel like nothing and made her realize she needs a real house, one that is really nice. Esperanza wants to change her life and make the best of what she has.

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House on Mango Street analysis essay: Hopes and Dreams In the House on Mango Street, a novel by Sandra Cisneros, she suggests the notion that hopes and dreams can be obtained even when people are at the bottom of the totem pole as seen in Esperanza’s desire to live in a better place and find friends. One way that Sandra Cisneros suggests this theme is when Esperanza feels ashamed of her current house and knows “she has to have a real house. One she can point to and feel proud of (Cisneros 5) Another example is when Esperanza and the nun are talking and the nun asks where Esperanza lives and she is forced to “point to the the third floor, with the paint peeling”

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Those Who Don’t “Those Who Don’t” is a short vignette in Sandra Cisneros's novella, The House on Mango Street, although short, it carries an important theme that allows a more thorough understanding of others - Don’t judge something or someone based on the current info, things can be surprisingly different than you imagined. Esperanza lives in a neighborhood where people see them as dangerous people because of the area. Cisnero develops this theme by using a family who, accidentally, stumbles into Esperanza’s neighborhood. She reinforces the theme by using descriptive words and Esperanza’s own perspective.

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Esperanza sees many different hardships that women she knows face. She doesn’t entirely understand until she is older, but she sees what these women do or don’t do to survive. Sandra Cisneros shows Esperanza’s point of view on the women her life in many of the vignettes in the book The House on Mango Street. From when Esperanza first moves to her house on Mango Street, to every up and down she faces. Esperanza has a wide range of female role models to show her what and what not to do.

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But still feels lonely. Also, throughout the story Esperanza gets negative attention from boys because of her culture. For some men she comes across in the story they see her as a toy for her ethnicity and not being from America. This also embarrasses her as she is still trying to find out what love is but can’t because if the negative attention. Therefore, even though she struggles pushing through with her ethnicity, others have it just as hard as well, showing how different ethnicities can clash.

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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.

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Cisneros writes, “That one? she said pointing to a row of ugly three-flats, the ones even the raggedy men are ashamed to go into. ”(p.45). This quote shows how even the Nuns at her school viewed her house in a poor manner as well. This shamed Esperanza in a deeper way than from what the nun probably expected.

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Esperanza faces multiple conflicts in the house on mango street but the one particularly strikes her is how adult men see her as a women and how she see’s herself as a women. In cisneros house on mango street , Esperanza's faces with how adult men see her to how she see’s herself as a women . Men find her beautiful and attractive and manipulate her in various ways. She compares herself to multiple things in the neighborhood to figure out what role she plays as a women.

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Esperanza is often humiliated not only by where she lives, but also by her physical appearance, hence causing a restriction in her climb to a higher social class. Esperanza is frequently ashamed of her family’s broken-down house in an urban, poor

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1627 Words | 7 Pages

In the House on Mango Street, Esperanza is seeking for an identity of her own. In her current neighborhood, she struggles with economic, cultural, and gender based barriers to personal growth, and she believes that changing her surroundings is her solution; however, she realizes that to discover her identity, her ultimate destination is a home in the heart. The house on Mango Street was one that was the opposite of what Esperanza had dreamt her entire life. The house is, “…small and red with tight steps in front and windows so small you 'd think they were holding their breath... bricks...crumbling in places, and the front door...so swollen you have to push hard to get in". (Cisneros 5)

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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

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