Nowadays, society is hoping for equal rights for both men and women.

However, this still

is not perfect now, and in the 80s it was even further away from the “gender equality” current
society hopes for. In the coming-of-age novel The House On Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros,
the main character, Esperanza, goes through various events on Mango Street. As Esperanza
becomes more mature, she faces challenges in society directed towards women. Sandra Cisneros,
through various events on Mango Street, clearly illustrates women’s social status in society from
the perspective of Esperanza, especially in the 80s.
First, in this novel, which is dealing with society in the 80s, the view towards girls and
women isn’t equal to the view towards boys and men. For instance, in the introduction, Cisneros’
father sets an example of a girl he wants his daughter (the author) to be. He “wants his daughter
to be a weather girl on television, or to marry and have babies” (xv). This is one of the gender
roles and stereotypes set towards women. This quote means that men, at least some of them like
Cisneros’ father, view women to be like the ones on TV (“weather girl”) that are all “beautiful”
and “attractive”. They also view that women should marry men and have babies, even if they
don’t want to. One other man’s views of women in the 80s is revealed in the chapter called
“Alicia Who Sees Mice”. In this chapter, the father of a girl called Alicia says, “a woman’s place
is sleeping so she can wake up early with the tortilla star, the one that appears early just in time
to rise and catch the hind legs hide behind the sink, beneath the four-clawed tub, under the
swollen floorboards nobody fixes, in the corner of your eyes” (31). In this quote, “tortilla star”
means tortilla for breakfast which will be given to the men. The quote means that women “must”
be in a “woman's place” where they have to wake up early in the morning just to serve “the
tortilla star” to men. This is overall a stereotypical statement about women’s social status. It
decides the women’s social status as the one serving the men, or the one that is under men. Thus,
it implies that the view of Alicia’s father is that men must have a higher social status, resulting in
more power and rights, than women. Overall, these quotes in the book suggest that there are men
who believe in gender roles and for women to be “like women”.
Under those circumstances, through different characters in the book, Sandra Cisneros
illustrates girls and women who are stuck in society with stereotypes built by men. First in the
chapter “My Name,” Esperanza’s grandmother is described shortly as, “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. Just like that, as if she were a fancy chandelier. That’s the way he did it” (10-11). The
quote illustrates the situation in which Esperanza’s great-grandfather “threw a sack over”
Esperanza’s grandmother. This is an example of domestic violence as it causes physical harm to
Esperanza’s grandmother without her consent. As the book continues, there are many more
examples of domestic violence towards women, including chapter “Minerva Writes Poems”. In
this chapter, there is domestic violence towards a character called Minerva: “One day she is
through and lets him know enough is enough. Out the door he goes. Clothes, records, shoes. Out
the window and the door locked. But that night he comes back and sends a big rock through the
window. Then he is sorry and she opens the door again. Same story” (85). Here, Minerva is
locked in the house and a rock is thrown at her, which happens without consent and causes
physical harm. Therefore, it is also domestic violence. Also, In chapter “What Sally Said,”
domestic violence towards Sally is described with minimal figurative language and is not
romanticized in order for it to illustrate the situation more accurately:
He never hits me hard. She said her mama rubs lard on all the places where it
hurts. Then at school she’d say she fell. That’s where all the blue places come
from. That’s why her skin is always scarred. But who believes her. A girl that big,
a girl who comes in with her pretty face all beaten and black can’t be falling off
the stairs. He never hits me hard. But Sally doesn’t tell about that time he hit her
with his hands just like a dog, she said, like if I was an animal. He thinks I’m
going to run away like his sisters who made the family ashamed. Just because I’m
a daughter, and then she doesn’t say…one day Sally’s father catches her talking to
a boy and the next day she doesn’t come to school. And the next. Until the way
Sally tells it, he just went crazy, he just forgot he was her father between the
buckle and the belt. You’re not my daughter, you’re not my daughter. And then he
broke into his hands. (92-93)
The beaten face and scars are evidence of domestic violence, but Sally says he (Sally’s father)
did not hit her. This is probably because either the father forces her to hide the truth or Sally is
too scared to reveal the truth. The quote describes the father hitting Sally very hard and acting as
if Sally is not a human. In addition, this is one of the examples of objectification towards girls
and women in the book because girls and women are often treated as objects, not humans with
their own mind and feelings. Sally becomes stuck in the situation with domestic violence caused
by her father. Overall, the book consistently includes descriptions of how the men physically hit
and cause harm to their wives and daughters, which is a part of the women’s low social status.
In addition, Sally and Marin represent the women that have become dependent on
society. In chapter “The Monkey Garden”, Sally becomes involved in a “game” in which “One
of the boys invented the rules. One of Tito’s friends says you can’t get the keys back unless you
kiss us and Sally pretended to be mad at first but she said yes. It was that simple” (96). The quote
indicates the maturity of Sally and how she now gets involved with boys physically. This leads
Sally into being more dependent on men and marrying very early. Later, she escapes her father’s
pressure by marrying, but now she is in a situation (in chapter “Linoleum Roses'') where “She is
happy, except sometimes her husband gets angry and once he broke the door where his foot went
through, though most days he is okay. Except he won’t let her talk on the telephone. And he
doesn’t let her look out the window. And he doesn’t like her friends, so nobody gets to visit her
unless he is working” (101-102). The contrast, or the antithesis, in the chapter contrasts Sally’s
thoughts and reality. Sally is “happy” and her husband is “mostly okay,” but really Sally is stuck
at home without contact on the phone, on the window, or in person. She is only with her
husband, who sometimes gets very angry. The quotes, overall, give evidence that Sally is stuck
in the society and very dependent on men. Similarly, Marin is also stuck in society and
dependent on men. In chapter “Marin,” she is described as “Marin, under the streetlight, dancing
by herself, is singing the same song somewhere. I know. Is waiting for a car to stop, a star to fall,
someone to change her life” (27). The metaphor in the last sentence (“a car to stop, a star to fall,
someone to change her life”) means that Marin is waiting for a man to be her husband to be
dependent on. The car and the star mean a person to stop by and notice Marin, and Marin is
waiting for that “someone” that will approach her and “change her life”. Overall, Sally and
Marin demonstrate the characteristics that contrast to Esperanza’s, as they are the ones that
represent dependence, whereas Esperanza represents independence.
Furthermore, Esperanza, who represents independence, is also consistently threatened by
the society. Throughout the book, there are parts where Esperanza is objectified and assaulted by
men. In chapter “The Family of Little Feet,” Esperanza and her friends go out with high heels
and experience the responsibilities that follow maturity in society. First, “On the avenue a boy on
a homemade bicycle calls out: Ladies, lead me to heaven” (41). Here, “lead me to heaven”
means “stay with me until I go to heaven (until I die),” or more simply “marry me”. The situation
is that a stranger just calls out to the girls to marry him. Then, Bum man (another stranger) calls
out to Rachel (one of Esperanza’s friends):
Bum man says, Yes, little girl. Your little lemon shoes are so beautiful. but come closer. I
can’t see very well. Come closer. Please. You are a pretty girl bum man continues. What’s
your name, pretty girl?... Rachel, you are prettier than a yellow taxicab. You know that?...
If I give you a dollar will you kiss me? How about a dollar. I give you a dollar, and he
looks in his pocket for wrinkled money. (41-42)
This illustrates another stranger that calls out and tries to pay Rachel to make her kiss him. In
both quotes in the chapter, Esperanza and her friends are objectified by men and they experience
real society. Later in chapter “The First Job,” Esperanza goes to work to earn money and meets
“an older Oriental man” (54) at work. The Oriental man asks Esperanza that “it was his birthday
and would I please give him a birthday kiss. I thought I would because he was so old and just as I
was about to put my lips on his cheek, he grabs my face with both hands and kisses me hard on
the mouth and doesn’t let go” (55). The man kisses Esperanza on the mouth without her consent,
which means Esperanza is sexually assaulted. This is the first time Esperanza is sexually
assaulted, and it happens again in chapter “Red Clowns”. The word “Red” in the chapter has a
two-sided meaning; it may symbolize happiness, but it also symbolizes blood and fear.
Esperanza, in this chapter, was surrounded by men: “The one who grabbed me by the arm, he
wouldn’t let me go. He said I love you, Spanish girl, I love you, and pressed his sour mouth to
mine… Only his dirty fingernails against my skin, only his sour smell again. The moon that
watched. The tilt-a-whirl. The red clowns laughing their thick-tongue laugh” (100). The quote
describes a man grabbing Esperanza and sexually assaulting her without her consent. Also, to
point out, the man calls Esperanza “Spanish girl”. The man didn’t call Esperanza by her name,
which is objectification. It also implies that Esperanza is in a lower status than the man because
people in lower status are often not called by their names. Finally, Esperanza is not Spanish, but
Latino. However, the man still calls Esperanza “Spanish girl” which is discrimination against
Esperanza. While Esperanza wants to be independent, there still is the obstacle of society she has
to go through to get to her goal.
Despite all the society’s limitations set on women, Esperanza does not stop moving onto
her way of independence. Esperanza always wants to be someone special. This is implied in
many parts of the book. For example, in chapter “My Name” she says, “I would like to baptize
myself under a new name, a name more like the real me, the one nobody sees” (11). Also, in
chapter “A Rice Sandwich,” she says, “The special kids, the ones who wear keys around their
necks, get to eat in the canteen. The canteen! Even the name sounds important” (43) and soon
she asks her mother to let her eat lunch in the canteen. Esperanza wants a new name because her
great-grandmother had the same name, but she wants a different and “special” name of her own.
She also wants to eat in the canteen because the ones that ate in the canteen looked “special”.
Both quotes imply that Esperanza wants to be special, on her own, and independent. Her wish for
independence is more clear as she states in chapter “Beautiful & Cruel”. She says “I have
decided not to grow up tame like the others who lay their necks on the threshold waiting for the
ball and chain” (88). The metaphor means that she is not going to be dependent on men like
animals that are “tame” with a “ball and chain” taking their freedom away. Esperanza also wants
to have a house. In chapter “The House of Mango Street,” she clarifies that she wants a house: “I
knew then I had to have a house. A real house. One I could point to. But this isn’t it. The house
on Mango Street isn’t it. For the time being, Mama says. Temporary, says Papa. But I know how
those things go” (5). This is later described, in chapter “A House of My Own,” as “Not an
apartment in back. Not a man’s house. Not a daddy’s. A house all my own. With my porch and
my pillow, my pretty purple petunias. My books and my stories. My two shoes waiting beside
the bed. Nobody to shake a stick at. Nobody’s garbage to pick up after. Only a house quiet as
snow, a space for myself to go, clean as paper before the poem” (108). This also connects to the
introduction, where the author wanted a house herself. She says, “As a girl, she dreamed about
having a silent home, just to herself, the way other women dreamed of their weddings. Instead of
collecting lace and linen for her trousseau, the young woman buys old things from the thrift
stores on grimy Milwaukee Avenue for her future house-of-her-own---faded quilts, cracked
vases, chipped saucers, lamps in need of love” (xii). Esperanza, like the author, wishes for a
house of her own. This is apparent in chapter “Elenita, Cards, Palm, Water” where she asks
Elenita “What about a house, I say, because that’s what I came for” (64). The change of house
means more than just the words. The change of house means that the comfortable place that
someone consistently comes back to has a different owner. Esperanza and the author want a
place with everything hers and all the power to herself, and she would be independent at a new
house. Therefore, wishing for a house is actually a result of wishing for independence. On the
other hand, she, in chapter “Four Skinny Trees,” connects herself with the trees. Personification
is used to compare herself with the trees about how they do not belong to their places. She
describes the trees as “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. Four raggedy excuses planted by the city” (74). The four skinny
trees in the quote are regarded as “similar” ones as Esperanza. Therefore, these are used to mirror
Esperanza, who feels like she does not belong where she currently stands. She hopes for changes
in women’s lives in society and she has to take action herself for it, just like in a quote in chapter
“Alicia & I Talking on Edna’s Steps”. Here, Esperanza and Alicia have a conversation with each
other: “No, Alicia says. Like it or not you are Mango Street, and one day you’ll come back too.
Not me. Not until somebody makes it better. Who’s going to do it? The mayor? And the thought
of the mayor coming to Mango Street makes me laugh out loud. Who’s going to do it? Not the
mayor” (107). What Alicia says means that nobody is going to change the situation if Esperanza
does not do it. Overall, the main character, created by the author to symbolize independence, has
a mindset to fight against the society for women’s rights.
To conclude, throughout the book, Sandra Cisneros has been consistently describing a
society that was unfair for women in the 80s, from Esperanza’s experiences. The idea of gender
roles and gender inequality lie under the book, which consistently come out in many chapters of
the novel to show the truth of society’s action towards women. The contents of the book help
raise awareness to the readers so that women fight for their rights and men know that gender
inequality problems exist in society. The novel, therefore, plays a significant role in solving the
problem for the discriminated female community and in leading society towards gender equality.

Criterion A: analysing
Level 1-2 Level 3-4 Level 5-6 Level 7-8

The student: The student: The student: The student:

A1: Provides limited A1: Provides adequate A1: Competently A1: Provides perceptive
analysis of the content, analysis of the content, analyzes the content, analysis of content,
context, language, context, language, context, language, context, language,
structure, technique and structure, technique and structure, technique, style structure, technique, style
style of text(s) and the style of text(s) and the of text(s) and the of text(s) and the
relationship among texts. relationship among texts. relationships among texts. relationship among texts.
A2: Provides limited A2: Provides adequate A2: Competently A2: Perceptively
analysis of the effects of analysis of the effects of analyzes the effects of the analyzes the effects of the
the creator’s choices on the creator’s choices on creator’s choices on an creator’s choices on an
an audience. an audience. audience. audience.
A3: Rarely justifies
opinions and ideas with
examples or explanations;
uses little or no
terminology.
A4: Evaluates few
similarities and differences
by making minimal
connections in features
across and within genres
and texts.
A3: Justifies opinions and
ideas with some
examples and
explanations, though this
may not be consistent;
uses some terminology.
A4: Evaluates some
similarities and differences
by making adequate
connections in features
across and within genres
and texts.
A3: Sufficiently justifies A3: Gives detailed
opinions and ideas with justification of opinions
examples and and ideas with a range of
explanations; uses examples, and thorough
accurate terminology. explanations; uses
A4: Evaluates similarities accurate terminology.
and differences by making A4: Perceptively
substantial connections compares and contrasts
in features across and by making extensive
within genres and texts. connections in features
across and within genres
and texts.

Task specific clarifications:

Task 1: You will analyze the novel The House on Mango Street. You will demonstrate an understanding
of the relevant literary terms in order to discuss the author’s theme. You will provide specific textual
evidence in order to interpret themes and meaning from the work. You will also thoughtfully examine
the author’s choices and the impact on the audience from a critical standpoint.

Student justifications: Teacher Justifications:

A1:
A2:
A3:
A4:
Criterion B: organising
Level 1-2 Level 3-4 Level 5-6 Level 7-8

The student: The student: The student: The student:

B1: Makes minimal use B1: Makes adequate use B1: Makes competent B1: Makes sophisticated
of organizational of organizational use of organizational use of organizational
structures, though these structures that serve the structures that serve the structures that serve the
may not always serve the context and intention. context and intention. context and intention
context and intention. B2: Organizes opinions B2: Organizes opinions effectively.
B2: Organizes opinions and ideas with some and ideas in a coherent B2: Effectively organizes
and ideas with a minimal degree of coherence and logical manner, with opinions and ideas in a
degree of coherence and logic. ideas building on each sustained, coherent and
and logic. B3: Makes adequate use other. logical manner with ideas
B3: Makes minimal use of referencing and B3: Makes competent building on each other in a
of referencing and formatting tools to create use of referencing and sophisticated way.
formatting tools to create a presentation style formatting tools to create B3: Makes excellent use
a presentation style that suitable to the context and a presentation style of referencing and
may not always be intention. suitable to the context and formatting tools to create
suitable to the context intention. an effective presentation
and intention. style.

Task specific clarifications:

Task 1: You will organise your ideas using textual evidence and commentary, using a structure
appropriate to an analysis.
Times New Roman, 12 pt font. 1.15 to double spaced

Student justifications: Teacher Justifications:

B1:
B2:
B3:
Criterion D: using language
Level 1-2 Level 3-4 Level 5-6 Level 7-8

The student: The student: The student: The student:

D1: Uses a limited range D1: Uses an adequate D1: Uses a varied range D1: Effectively uses a
of appropriate vocabulary range of appropriate of appropriate vocabulary, range of appropriate
and forms of expression. vocabulary, sentence sentence structures and vocabulary, sentence
D2: Writes in an structures and forms of forms of expression structures and forms of
inappropriate register expression. competently. expression.
and style that do not D2: Sometimes writes in D2: Writes competently D2: Writes in a
serve the context and
a register and style that in a register and style that consistently appropriate
intention.
serve the context and serve the context and register and style that
D3: Uses grammar,
intention. intention. serve the context and
syntax and punctuation
D3: Uses grammar, D3: Uses grammar, intention.
with limited accuracy;
errors often hinder syntax and punctuation syntax and punctuation D3: Uses grammar,
communication. with some degree of with a considerable syntax and punctuation
accuracy; errors degree of accuracy; with a high degree of
D4: Spells/writes with
sometimes hinder errors do not hinder accuracy; errors are minor
limited accuracy; errors
communication. effective communication. and communication is
often hinder
D4: Spell/writes with D4: Spells/writes with effective.
communication.
some degree of considerable degree of D4: Spells/writes with a
accuracy; errors accuracy; errors do not high degree of accuracy;
sometimes hinder hinder effective errors are minor and
communication. communication. communication is
effective.

Task specific clarifications:

Task 1: You will use clear and specific language appropriate to a literary analysis to communicate your
ideas.

Student justifications: Teacher Justifications:

D1:
D2:
D3:
D4: