Traditional Roles In The House On Mango Street

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Over the last few years America has had a momentous change in the portrayal of traditional roles in not just families but also in the community. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros focuses on the adolescents of a young Latino girl named Esperanza, and her struggle with comprehending the world around her. Her experiences on Mango Street help her mature into the prodigious writer that she later becomes. Esperanza gradually becomes more conscious of the struggles around her and vows to do something influential with her life. Although many of the women in Esperanza’s life have a very traditional role in society, ultimately, Esperanza decides to do something more meaningful with her life through the guidance of her great-grandmother and …show more content…
In the chapter My Name, Esperanza mentions how she hates her name in particular not only because it is an unusual name in America, but also due to the personal meaning behind it. Esperanza never met her great-grandmother but they shared the same name. Her great-grandmother was forced into a traditional marriage and did not have the opportunity to live out her life the way she wanted. When describing her great-grandmother, Esperanza wonders if she “made the best with what she got or was she sorry because she couldn’t be all the things she wanted to be” (10). Esperanza is a free spirit much like her relative and does not want to be tied down to the conventional roles given to Latino women. She reveals this when she says, “I have inherited her name, but I don’t want to inherit her place by the window” (10). Esperanza feels that since she has the same name as her great-grandmother, she will end up with the same fate as her. As a result of this, Esperanza sympathizes with her great-grand mother’s dreams of wanting something more than the simple life presented to her and the hope of creating a change. Esperanza’s great-grandmother caused her to ask more from life and to confront her obstacles head