Esperanza's Rising By Pam Munzos Ryan

Esperanza Rising is a story written by Pam Muñoz Ryan about a rich girl named Esperanza. Esperanza soon changes her outlook on the world after many horrific events force her to choose what’s most important. At the very beginning of the story, Esperanza was a spoiled girl who had everything she wanted; she thought nothing could go wrong.

The character Esperanza in Esperanza Rising is a Mexican girl who is transitioning from rich to poor when her father dies and her uncles take over her home. She is forced to move to America as a laborer and faces many internal and external conflicts. Esperanza struggles with the sudden change in her social status as she is ripped away from her life of comfort and luxury. Because of her wealthy upbringing, Esperanza is inherently spoiled. Thus, her new environment is so much harder to cope with as she doesn't have the comforts she usually expects.

You can't imagine how hard people had it during the great the depression? Well, Esperanza couldn't either until she got a taste of the hardship in the book, “Esperanza Rising.” Where young Esperanza went through a lot of personal growth after a series of events. These events lead up to her going from riches to rags. Esperanza’s experiences changed her and flipped her world upside down, in a good way.

Further into the novel, Esperanza travels to America. This is new for Esperanza and she is confused on the new lifestyle that she is merging into. She

Esperanza says that she will come back, she will come back for “the ones I left behind... the ones who cannot out”. (Cisneros 110). Esperanza is able to go through a change and accept who she is through her community and her family. She is able to use her situation to empower herself, and to be hopeful in her own

As a child, Esperanza wants only escape from mango Street. Her dream of independents and "self-definition" also means leaving her family behind without any responsibilities to her family. Throughout the book, her has also faced some situation where is feels ashamed to be part of the Mango Street community and in some instances refuses to admit she has anything to do with mango street. At the beginning of the book near the earlier chapters, Esperanza feels very insecure about herself in general along with the house that she lives in. As mentioned before, she doesn’t want to discuss her name nor where she lives.

“In the meantime they’ll just have to move a little farther north from Mango Street, a little farther away every time people like us keep moving in (Cisneros 13).” This quote is a significant part of the story because it shows how Esperanza truly feels about herself and her family. She thinks that because she is poor and lives and a bad neighborhood people move away from her family. Esperanza doesn’t think very much of her or her family at all. She thinks that it is because of their race that people do not want to be near them.

Esperanza is often humiliated not only by where she lives, but also by her physical appearance, hence causing a restriction in her climb to a higher social class. Esperanza is frequently ashamed of her family’s broken-down house in an urban, poor

Though by realizing this, she needed to mature mentally. She attempts to break the barriers of typical Latin culture and become someone else in this world. By the end of the novel, she does not let her background define who she going to be but rather a starting point on who she is going to become. Esperanza is willing to do something so many Latina women

Still Esperanza does not get what is going on at this point. She is still so naïve and innocent. Sometimes the reader forgets how young she actually is because of the things she is going through at such a young age. Her mind and her decisions are moving at a faster pace, but she is still so blind to the world.

Obstacles Numerous people stumble upon obstacles, but only a few can overcome them. Most obstacles are influenced by the values of the society. In The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Liesel Meminger overcomes her lack of education and her different beliefs on Jewish people. In Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet both overcome the obstacle of not being able to be together because of the feud between their families. In “The House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros, Esperanza overcomes the obstacle of not fitting into her society because of her lack of money.

Upon arriving at the lunch with her homemade sandwich and a note she was brought into the administrator’s office and yelled at. During the confrontation Esperanza was embarrassed and ashamed to the point of tears due to the poor handling of the encounter. This is a portrayal of how authority figures can inadvertently turn something into a fiasco for others depending on how they decide to deal with an issue. They can either shut down the situation maturely or they can degrade the person(s) and make it a shameful experience that could alter the personality of the body in

The male-dominated society that Esperanza grows up in forces the idea that women are weak and should stay locked in their houses while men go off to work. The men are immoral and seedy, as expressed in the chapter in which a homeless man leers and asks for a kiss from the little girls. Esperanza experiences the evil of her community when she is sexually assaulted, causing her to lose her previous desire to explore her sexuality. Before being assaulted, she wanted to be “beautiful and cruel” like her friend Sally, because Sally was what she understood to be a perfect woman. However, after her rape she decides that she needs to discover her own identity for herself.

Esperanza the protagonist of the novel. In the neighborhood where she lives, many people that does not know the place are afraid to get there. The fact that they would think it is a neighborhood full of criminals. "They think we are dangerous. They think they will attack them with shiny knives.

“Not a flat, not an apartment in the back. Not a man’s house. Not daddy’s house. A house all my own”(108). Esperanza no longer strives to be popular, pretty or to be with boys.