The Theme of Idenity and Defining Yourself in The House on Mango Street

What influences a person’s identity? Is it their religion, home, parents, their neighborhood? When do they get one? When they learn right from wrong? Are they born with it? Everybody has one but it’s different from each other. A person’s identity is their own. No one put it there and no one can take it out whether they dislike it. Everyone makes their own throughout the course of life, there is no one thing that gives a person their identity. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros is about a young Mexican/American girl named Esperanza who moves with her family to a house on Mango Street. It is a small house in a poor neighborhood. She is ashamed of her parents poverty and she lies to try and hide the fact that she is poor. Going through puberty causes Esperanza to feel ashamed.

Esperanza talks about how she doesn’t like herself and how she wishes to change her identity and become someone who truly defines her. In the vignette “Born Bad”, it says, “I want to be like the waves on the sea, like the clouds in the wind, but I’m me. One day I’ll jump out of my skin. I’ll shake the sky like a hundred violins”. This quote talks about how she wants to be able to be someone who stands out. The literary device is simile. This is connected to my theme because it talks about identity. Another quote is in the vignette “My Name”, it says, “I would like to baptize myself under a new name, a name more like the real me, the one nobody sees. Esperanza as Lisandra or Maritza or ZeZe the X. Yes. Something like ZeZe the X will do”. This quote talks about one of the many things Esperanza doesn’t love about herself. The literary device is symbolism because it talks about how Esperanza wants a name that represents something to her, not one that doesn’t mean anything. This is connected to my theme because it talks about being able to define yourself.

Esperanza feels as if she doesn’t belong where she is. In the vignette “Four Skinny Trees”, it says, “They are the only ones who understand me. I am the only one who understands them. Four skinny trees with skinny necks and pointy elbows like mine. Four who do not belong here but are here”. This quote is talking about how she can relate to these four skinny trees and how they’re just like her. The literary device is simile. This is connected to my theme because Esperanza is comparing herself to trees. Another quote is in the vignette “Those who Don’t”, it says, “All brown all around, we are safe. But watch us drive into a neighborhood of another color and our knees go shakity-shake and our car windows get rolled up tight and our eyes look straight”. This quote is talking about how people of color don’t belong with white people. They have to look straight ahead to prove that they aren’t afraid scared of anyone. This is connected to my theme because it shows how people of color cannot be able to express their identity around other people superior of color.

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, uses simile to develop the theme of identity and defining yourself. This theme is important and relevant to the real world because there are people out there just like Esperanza who dislike some things about themselves and have trouble finding/expressing their inner self.