Esperanza's Change In The House On Mango Street

Esperanza is shaped into the person she was at the end of the book by a series of events, both good and bad. The people behind these events caused Esperanza to change in some way, and ultimately leading to the decision she makes at the end. As she grows up, she begins to notice the women and their struggles around her. She observes the women around her, searching for a female role model. In “My Name”, Esperanza explains the origin of her name: “it was my great-grandmother’s name and now it is mine…[she was] a wild horse of a woman, so wild she wouldn’t marry. Until my great-grandfather threw a sack over her head and carried her off...and the story goes she never forgave him. She looked out the window her whole life.” (pg 10, 11) Esperanza tells readers how happy her grandmother was until she got married, which she refused to do until she was forced to. Cisnero clearly included this vignette to tell readers Esperanza will not follow her grandmother’s steps and fall under her culture’s expectations for women.
In “The Family of Little Feet”, she and two other neighborhood girls get old high-heeled shoes. As they parade around the neighborhood, they receive unwanted attention from a bum on the street. He tells them, “If I gave you a dollar will you kiss me? How about a dollar…” (pg 42) Esperanza’s “grown-up” shoes cause the men around her to notice them in a previously unknown way. As Esperanza continues to grow up, she is susceptible to men’s attentions. In her first job, she is kissed forcefully by a man, and in “Red Clowns”, she is assaulted against her will. She learns how men can forcefully take what they want because that is what society seems to accept around