Sexual Maturity in The House on Mango Street Essay Sample

📌Category: Books, The House on Mango Street
📌Words: 952
📌Pages: 4
📌Published: 23 February 2022

Esperanza, a Chicano teen, wants to sexually mature and grow up quickly. She wants to do this to gain freedom and leave mango street and find a real home. In “The House on Mango Street '' the author, Cisneros, uses examples of Esperanza’s sexual maturation which is affected by who she had friendships with, how she forces herself to mature, and the horrific experiences she ends up dealing with.

Esperanza gains a greater understanding of sexual maturity by who she associates with. One person she does this with is Marin, a boy-crazy Mexican girl that’s Esperanza’s neighbor's cousin. Marin is an idol for Esperanza because she wants to escape mango street, similar to Esperanza. Marin has chosen that the way she wants to escape is by meeting “...someone on the subway who might marry you and take you to live in a big house far away” (Cisneros, 26). Esperanza, who hasn’t chosen how she wants to escape, wants to be more like Marin and thus makes similar choices as her. The idolization of Marin and men for Esperanza lead to her getting into unsafe scenarios where she is put into danger. She strives for men is also shown with how she wants them to treat her sexually saying that “What matters… is for the boys to see us and for us to see them” (Cisneros, 27). This belief of Marin makes men objectify women and only treat them sexually impacting Esperanza’s ideas of sex. Additionally strengthens the idea that the only way of escaping is by being sexual towards men and trying to gain their attention.  This also strengthens the idea of putting men on a pedestal and not giving attention to things that could help you actually escape like Esperanza. Another example of this is Sally, a neighbor who is trapped in a window by her father. Like Marin, Sally rebels against her father by being sexual with men. Esperanza also looks up to her to learn more and mature. The way Sally is sexualized is shown by “The boys at school [who] think she's beautiful because her hair is shiny black like raven feathers...” (Cisneros, 101). The beauty standards that the boys have because of Sally makes Esperanza unconfident in herself which leads to her wanting to be more like Sally. This makes Esperanza want the same amount of attention that Sally gets from men, furthering her being sexualized by them. 

Esperanza sexually matures when she forces herself to grow up. She does this many ways, one of which is in the family of little feet when she dresses up. Esperanza and her friends are given high heels from a family in the neighborhood. They put on these high heels and walk “Down to the corner where the men can’t take their eyes off us. We must be Christmas” she says (Cisneros, 40). In this quote, Esperanza is proud of her and her friends' abilities to attract and be sexualized by men. Esperanza forces herself into this scenario by dressing up and parading themselves. This causes her to learn more about sexual maturity and being treated sexually by men even though she is still mature Another example of Esperanza forcing herself to sexually mature is by desiring men because of an outcome. In hips when Esperanza is becoming sexually mature about herself and others. She starts off the chapter with a quote jump skipping a song, “I like coffee, I like tea. I like boys and boys like me. Yes, no, maybe so. Yes, no, maybe so”(Cisneros, 49). The quote puts the harsh reality of Esperanza growing up sexually into a form of light and happiness. This realization of sexual relationships between men and women for Esperanza is something that is easygoing and not harmful to worry about. However, this affects Esperanza’s ideals of how to sexually mature and what she needs to do later in her life. It also affects her view on men supporting the idea of needing men to survive and grow, 

Throughout the text Esperanza, because of her age, approaches her sexual maturation from the perspective of a young person who’s unfamiliar with most of these more adult situations. However, in some scenarios, her experience reflects the scary and sometimes serious nature of this maturation process. Esperanza really matures in examples when she is put in sexual situations and then changes her views on them. An example of this is Esperanza trusting Sally goes to a fair with her to ultimately be forced to sexually mature. When she goes to the fair, a group of boys sexually assault her. Growing up in stories, movies and by Sally, she was told sex is love and how good every time. Sally teaches Esperanza about this but when it happens she says that Sally “...lied. It wasn’t what you said at all. What he did. Where he touched me” (Cisneros, 99). This is a time in the story where she gets into things like sex that causes her to change her expectations of what it is. From those surrounding her, she learns that it was a good thing but finds out that it isn’t like what they said it was. This was because of the way the boys touched her and the way they didn't like what the boys did to her. After others fantasize what love and sex were like she learns that it’s a horrific thing. Another example of this is when Esperanza gets too confident in herself and forces herself to be both sexually and normally mature. She and her family want money, along with the desire to grow up and Esperanza gets a job. She meets an older man at her job and gets comfortable with him, when she does “...he grabs [her] face with both hands and kisses [her] hard on the mouth and doesn’t let go” (Cisneros, 55). This is an example of Esperanza being young and not knowing what to do in certain sexual scenarios. She trusts this man, loses more of her innocence, and is put into a situation where she has to mature, and thus from the people around her change her opinion on sexual matters.

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