The House On Mango Street Theme Essay

There are many themes that are important to the story in The House On Mango Street. Alienation and initiation are two themes that I found myself coming across repeatedly. Both of these themes are central in Esperanza’s story. Esperanza is someone who is torn between two different cultures, those being her Mexican heritage and her life in Chicago. In The House on Mango Street we watch as Esperanza struggles to grow up in a place where it is difficult to connect with both her life at home and integrate into the culture she is currently living in. One of the chapters where I most interestingly saw the theme of alienation was the chapter entitled “Chanclas.” Though not as explicit as it is in other chapters, Esperanza’s struggle with being seen as “other” is present. In this chapter, Esperanza attends her younger cousin’s baptism. For this event, Esperanza’s mother gets her a new dress and socks, but forgets the shoes. Because of this, she has to wear her worn down
We see this in almost all of the chapters, Esperanza is struggling to grow into a person she is proud of being. She wishes very much to be someone other than who she is; this is a key part in growing up. In the chapter “The Family of Little Feet” we see Esperanza doing something seen as being a grown up thing. She, along with her sister and her friend, wears high heels around. They feel very grown up in these shows, they find them to be very beautiful. When they are accosted by a “bum man” who asks Rachel for a kiss, they are no longer so keen on the high heeled shoes. After they run home, they toss the shoes into a bush behind their house and never wear them again; none of them caring when they are thrown away. Esperanza is very much in the process of growing up in this story, and perhaps she even wants to grow up. Even as this may be, we see in this chapter that she may be okay with waiting on some grown up