Abstract

Oppression of Identity and Literature, Research.

In this paper, I argue that the small rebellions one partakes in every day are more representative of identity than the societal structures one subscribes to. I reflect on characters in The House on Mango Street and the ways they rebel against the oppression they are facing. In the first section of my paper, I discuss fate, God, and the lack of control the divine has over whom we become. 

Then, I discuss the way women are oppressed in marriages due to societal and cultural beliefs that do not allow a woman to be anything other than a mother. I point to the ways these women use the little control they do have to express themselves whether it be by drinking papaya juice or writing poems they cannot show people.  

Most importantly, I conclude with a parallel between the oppression Esperanza is facing and the oppression the novel is facing. I examine her writing as a rebellious act against a literary system that is her only escape route from Mango Street. Esperanza’s only way out of her oppression is to write a novel that can express exactly whom she identifies as, that denies literary discrimination, racial and gender discrimination and economic deprivation in order to identify and create a self as well as a novel.