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Recommended: narrative about home
The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros portrays the struggles adolescent Mexican girls go through. The story is about a girl named Esperanza who is trying to figure out who she is. Esperanza dreams of the ‘ideal’ home. Through Esperanza’s eyes an ideal home consists of “…house would be white with trees around it, a great big yard and grass growing…” (Cisneros 4) When her family moves to a new home she is disappointed by the house she sees. The house is small and old, she descries the house as; “Bricks are crumbling in places, and the front door is so swollen you have to push hard to get in” It was not what she thought it would be. Esperanza feels that the house somewhat reflects who she is as a person, and the house is not a perfect home. She feels ashamed by her superficial identity. In the story Esperanza goes against everything she is raised to be, she wants to be different and break her family culture. The story suggests you The story revolves around the reality that Mexican girls are raised to find a man and get married. They have a mind set about having a man in their l...
Who does not want a home? A shelter to sleep and a roof to dine under. Of course no one wanted to stay home forever, but once in awhile and even when far away, they will long to return to that sacred place, the place where they grew up and the place they have left behind, home. The desire for a home (or house to be precise, though there was not much of a different for this case) was realistically reflected through a fiction work of Sandra Cisneros, a Mexican American write, a story called The House on Mango Street, where we shall discuss about its setting, plot and character.
A debutante’s life came at a price; for the 16 year-old Dolores it was an arranged, loveless marriage to lawyer Jaime Del Rio. Jaime was 18 years her senior, his family one of the oldest and most influential in Mexico. Their wealth allowed for a European honeymoon, where they were invited to dine with the Spanish Royal family. The honeymoon morphed into a three year romp, with Dolores delighting in voice and dance lessons at stately Madrid and Paris schools. In 1921, the couple returned to Mexico City, Jaime intent on advancing his career whil...
“Looking For Work” by Gary Soto deals with the life of a nine year old Mexican American boy who daydreams of a better life for his family. He believes that by emulating the families on TV such as from the show Father Knows Best, not only will his family grow closer, but each member of the family will be much more content. Contrary, the story “Little X” by Elizabeth Tallent also deals with a young child who also finds herself alienated from her family in a way that Soto feels alienated from his. Tallent is a young American girl who lives in the suburbs with her family as the depicted happy nuclear family in the 1950s but yet she feels the alienation between her and her parents and also feels estranged
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.
In the book House On Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, Esperanza tries to defy women’s gender roles while others blindly follow them, or give into them. Many chapters in the book are about gender roles like “No Speak English” or “Linoleum Roses.” but one that stuck out to me is “Alesia Who See’s Mice.” After Alicia’s mother died, her father was depending on Alesia to spend the rest of her life behind a rolling pin, or in a factory, but she wants to go to college. She is defying her gender roles by studying for college but she is also forced to wake up early and make lunch for her working dad. So in some ways she is defying gender roles but she is also giving into them because she has to get up early to cook. “Two trains and a bus, because she doesn't want to spend her entire life behind a rolling pin.”(31-32). Esperanza is narrating how Alesia is constantly moving around from university to house to factory. So Alesia is doing her best to defy gender roles.
In this short story Sandra uncover the tension between Mexican heritage and demands of the American culture. Cleofilas life consisted of never ending chorus, no good brothers, and a complaining father. She is so excited when the day come for her to become married so she can move away from her town where she grew up, were there isn’t much to do except accompany the aunts and godmothers to the house of one or the other to play cards. She was excited to be far away, all she could think about was to have a lovely house and to wear outfits like the women on the tele. Her picture of the ideal Mexican wife soon became a nightmare when she finally arrived to Texas, where she
In the story "Woman Hollering Creek" Sandra Cisneros discusses the issues of living life as a married woman through a character named Cleofilas; a character who is married to a man who abuses her physically and mentally .Cisneros reveals the way the culture puts a difference between a male and a female, men above women. Cisneros has been famous about writing stories about the latino culture and how women are treated; she explain what they go through as a child, teen and when they are married; always dominated by men because of how the culture has been adapted. "Woman Hollering Creek" is one of the best examples. A character who grows up without a mother and who has no one to guid and give her advise about life.
Sandra Cisneros reveals her feminist views through her novel The House on Mango Street. She does this by forcing the reader to see the protagonist as an alienated artist and by creating many strong and intelligent female characters who serve as the protagonist's inspiration.
“I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter”, by Erika L. Sanchez is a novel of shattering stereotype, Mexican teenager coming-of-age. Introducing Julia Reyes, fifteen-year-old teenager who desperately wants to go to college She’s a very outspoken sarcastic feminist with big dreams and a real hunger for art. The daughter of undocumented Mexican immigrants Ama and Apa, living in a apartment infested with roaches. She’s filled with anger almost all the time and perpetually bitter because she is poor. Suffering from the loss of her prude older sister, Olga, who died by being run over by a semi-truck. Julia battless with the death of her sister Olga, her parents are having a challenging time with Julia not wanting to be a perfect Mexican daughter. However, for Julia her life needs more than being your traditional Mexican daughter have a good office job, marrying a Mexican, raising children, and preparing tortilla until the day she dies. In which, Ama struggles with daily, on why Julia just can’t be perfect like her dead sister Olga. Even though families are based on culture and
The struggle to find a place inside an un-welcoming America has forced the Latino to recreate one. The Latino feels out of place, torn from the womb inside of America's reality because she would rather use it than know it (Paz 226-227). In response, the Mexican women planted the seeds of home inside the corral*. These tended and potted plants became her burrow of solace and place of acceptance. In the comfort of the suns slices and underneath the orange scents, the women were free. Still the questions pounded in the rhythm of street side whispers. The outside stare thundered in pulses, you are different it said. Instead of listening she tried to instill within her children the pride of language, song, and culture. Her roots weave soul into the stubborn soil and strength grew with each blossom of the fig tree (Goldsmith).
To help me understand and analyze a different culture, I watched the film Selena. The film tells the life story of the famous singer Selena Quintanilla-Pérez. Not only does it just tell personal stories from her life, it also gives insight to the Mexican-American culture. Her whole life she lived in the United States, specifically in Texas, but was Hispanic and because of that both her and her family faced more struggles than white singers on the climb to her success. Even though the film is a story about a specific person, it brought understanding into the culture in which she lived. Keeping in mind that these ideas that I drew about the Mexican-American culture is very broad and do not apply to every single person in the culture, there were very obvious differences in their culture and the one that I belong. Mexican-American culture identifies with their family rather than individualized or spiritual identities and the culture has gone through significant changes because of discrimination and the changing demographics of the United States.
Society set a standard many years ago that in a relationship, the woman depends on the man. In The House on Mango Street, woman tend to trust and not have power in relationships. Sandra Cisneros develops the theme that women are inferior to men. This is based on men’s view on power and women accepting their role through the motif of gender roles throughout the novella The House on Mango Street.
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.
To understand fully the implicit meaning and cultural challenges the film presents, a general knowledge of the film’s contents must be presented. The protagonist, Tita, suffers from typical Hispanic cultural oppression. The family rule, a common rule in this culture, was that the youngest daughter is to remain unwed for the duration of her mother’s life, and remain home to care for her. Mama Elena offers her daughter, Tita’s older sister Rosaura, to wed a man named Pedro, who is unknowingly in mutual love with Tita. Tita is forced to bake the cake for the wedding, which contains many tears that she cried during the process. Tita’s bitter tears cause all the wedding guests to become ill after consuming the cake, and Tita discovers she can influence others through her cooking. Throughout the film, Tita’s cooking plays an important role in all the events that transpire.
...Halevi-Wise, Yael (1997). Story-telling in Laura Esquivel's Como Agua Para Chocolate. The Other Mirror: Women’s Narrative in Mexico, 1980-1995. Ed. Kristine Ibsen. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1997. 123-131.