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Houses : Shelter to the Physical and Emotional Well-Being

Sandra Cisneros ' The House on Mango Street ' is not just another coming-of-age story it is also a story that has been written to conquer the personal difficulties of a Latina writer . Being Latina , she does not have many Chicano role models (Klein 21 , but she has strived to express herself in writing , theless . In the 1988 collection of fifty four vignettes , Cisneros makes the narrator , Esperanza , come alive through experiences ultimately caused by being

poor , female , and a minority , while giving the house the title role as it encompasses the dreams of families from any race : having a home to call their own . It is Cisneros ' way of dealing with the issues she herself has faced as a Latina is through her perseverance that they do not remain mere issues (O 'Malley 35 , but full-blooded experiences of a girl named Esperanza In the short story with the same name , Cisneros focuses on the dream of acquiring a home . Therefore , this coming-of-age short story emphasizes on the importance of the physical house to the emotional growth and identity of its residents

Esperanza relates the many times her family has to move from rented house or apartment to another : We didn 't always live on Mango Street Before that we lived on Loomis on the third floor and before that we lived on Keeler . Before Keeler it was Paulina , and before that I can 't remember . But I remember most was moving a lot (Cisneros 290

Mango Street is a change from all the moving because the family finally does not have to pay rent the house is supposed to be theirs (Cisneros 291 . However , the house still has some disappointments in store for Esperanza and her family . The house is not what Esperanza imagines a real house that they can proudly call their own to be

In the United States in particular , the house is more than just shelter it is a national institution almost as sacred as the American flag . In home ownership , the American dream and the American way are manifest : the civic values of individualism , economic success and self-sufficiency are asserted (Kaup 361

Esperanza and her family are striving to reach that American dream , to stop being substandard citizens who get to be asked disbelievingly by people You live there (Cisneros 291 . According to Esperanza the way it was asked made her feel like nothing . This is how sometimes people are judged by the house they live in . The house also affects the psyche of its residents . A clean , well-kept house may contribute to a clearer outlook while a house which reflects poverty can be a cause for shame , such as in the case of Esperanza and her family 's house on Mango Street (Klein 23

The short story The House on Mango Street ' may be very brief , but according to Thomas O ' Malley , an English teacher , he considers Cisneros ' writing ' as poetry...