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As a coming of age novel The House on Mango Street tells the story of Esperanza finding friends and developing a sense of belonging. After moving around often Esperanza did not feel like she belonged, but throughout the novel she finds friends that made her feel like she belonged.

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In this vignette Esperanza does not have a best friend yet but she is wishing for one. She is longing for a sense of friendship and belonging. She states, "Someday I will have a best friend all my own. One I can tell my secrets to. One who will understand my jokes without my having to explain them" (Cisneros 9). Her thoughts illustrates how she wants a best friend, because just like everyone else she wants to belong.

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This vignette helps develop the theme by showing Esperanza's connection to her friends compared to her connection with her sister. "Rachel and Lucy look at me like I'm crazy, but before they can let out a laugh, Nenny says: Yes, that's Mexico all right. That's what I was thinking exactly". This is an example of how Esperanza still has a disconnect with her friends. They don't have the same experiences as her, but her sister does. Nenny understands the way Esperanza sees things

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In this vignette it establishes the theme of friendship and belonging. Up until this point Esperanza expresses she only has one friend and it is Cathy, who is leaving soon because she is moving, Esperanza meets the neighborhood girls and they offer her a bike for $5, she knows taking the bike will ruin her and Cathy's friendship. Nonetheless, she takes the deal and they become friends for the future.

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"The boys and the girls live in separate worlds" (Cisneros 8). This hyperbole exemplifies how Esperanza thinks there is only certain groups she belongs in. She does not feel like she will be accepted by all groups.

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"Not the shy ice cream bells' giggle of Rachel and Lucy's family, but all of the sudden and surprised like a pile of dishes breaking." (Cisneros 17). This quote has both a metaphor and a simile in the same sentence. Both devices illustrate the difference between Esperanza and her friends. She feels apart from them. They are not the same, and in this part of the book, that fact is very hard for Esperanza to handle since she wants to fit in so bad.

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"Until then I am a red
balloon, a balloon tied to an anchor" (Cisneros 9). This metaphor shows how Esperanza wants to be free, but she is not. She does not feel free because she does not have that best friend that she can connect to in the world. She is not free because she does not yet feel as though she belongs.

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"I hold my Papa in my arms. I hold and hold and hold him"
Esperanza mentions this, and it really shows that she is growing up and is finding out her role. She really starts to figure out how she belongs in the family, and that she really cares about them.

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"But I like them. Their clothes are crooked and old. They are wearing shiny Sunday shoes without socks" (Cisneros 14-15). When Esperanza first meets Rachel and Lucy she describes them in unique ways due to her young age. However, through her description of them we see how her new potential friends are more similar to her. They have old crooked clothes, so does Esperanza. These similarities makes Esperanza feels like she belongs more with them.

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"In the canteen, was nothing special, lots of boys and girls watched while I cried and ate my sandwich, the bread already greasy and cold"(Cisneros 45). Esperanza is so desperate to want to be in the canteen because she thinks it is cool. But once she gets in, on unusual circumstances, she sees it is not what she wants. This is showing it's okay to be yourself and not need to do what others do to feel right.

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This vignette develops the theme through description. The vignette describes how well Esperanza knows the other people in her neighborhood. A very notable description would be how well she knows Cathy. She knows all the cats that she has, she know some family history, and I think that much of that is discovered through being friends with someone and talking to them.

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"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" (Cisneros 3). The repetition of "before that" emphasizes how much Esperanza has moved around throughout her life. She has moved around so much she can't even remember all of the houses. This emphasize illustrates to the reader that Esperanza has moved around a lot and does not feel like she belongs in any one place.

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"The little wooden door that has wedged shut the dark for so long opens with a sigh and lets out a breath of mold and dampness" (Cisneros 70). The use of this literary device helps the reader picture the kind of home Earl has. Its old, not taken care of, and overall seen as a creepy place to the children. This also further develops his character, and allows us to see how Esperanza views him, despite her naivety.

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"And all I can hear is the clapping [of the chanclas] when the music stops...All night the boy who is a man watches me dance. He watched me dance."(Cisneros 48). You can feel Esperanza is embarrassed by her shoes because they do not go with her outfit at all. She is wearing old loud chancla's with a nice new dress. She gives off a feeling of uneasiness as her cousin watched her dance all night.

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In a world flooded with social media and constant communication it is clear that everyone wants to belong. We see this happen with Esperanza. She so desperately wants a best friend who  understands her. Starting in elementary school we stress about making friends and keeping them so as to not feel alone. Feeling like you do not belong is isolating and often leads to a decline in one's mental health. We are creatures of connection and are shaped by those around us.

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This vignette helps develop the theme of friendship and belonging by providing a place for it to start. In this vignette, we see how lonely Esperanza is, and how she feels so out of place. She thinks that staying at school for lunch will result in her having friends, but instead, she ends up alone. The vignette shows how desperate she is to have friends, and to belong somewhere by showing us how she tries, and fails.

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"Who have the same fat popsicle lips like everybody else in their family" (Cisneros 17). She says this to describe how similar one can be with their family. Although someone may not realize it, they have a lot in common with their family. I think these similarities show a lot about belonging, because you will always belong with other people who are the same as you.

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We can tell as the novel begins Esperanza is young and impressionable. This is shown in "The House on Mango Street", when she goes into detail about how she expects her new house to be. " They always told us we would move into a house, a real house that would be ours for always so we would't have to move each year.. And it would have running water and pipes that worked. And inside it would have real stairs, not hallway stairs, but the stairs inside the house on T.V."(Cisneros 4). She is let down by her parents immediately as they see their house for the first time. Later in the story she is starting to mature as in "Boys and Girls" she says "Someday I will have a best friend all my own. One i can tell my secrets to. One who will understand my jokes without having to explain them."(Cisneros 9). She is starting to see the age difference in her and Nenny appear. and wants a friend her age. In the vignette "The First Job" she is starting to become much more independent, as she now gets a job and has to start saving up to pay for her schooling. Towards the end of the novel "Red Clowns" she ends up going to carnival with Sally and she meets a guy and they end up getting intimate, she does not like a single second of it, an she is complaining to Sally about how the movies lied. "Sally you lied. It wasn't what you said at all. What he did. Where we touched me. I didn't want it, Sally."(Cisneros 99). Her coming of age is shown through the events she went through and how she has changed because of them.

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What characteristics do you think are most important to a friendship and why?

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What characteristics do you think are most important to a friendship and why?

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How do we see Esperanza struggle to find friends with some of these characteristics?

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In the vignette "Boys & Girls" Esperanza says "Someday I will have a best friend all my own. One i can tell my secrets to. One who will understand my jokes without having to explain them. Until then I am  red balloon, a balloon tied to an anchor"(Cisneros 9). This is prominent because is shows how Esperanza is getting to the age of wanting real friends other than her siblings. It is showing she is starting to feel out of place with really only having Nenny, who is too young to understand and keep up with Esperanza.

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In the vignette "My Name" Esperanza says "I would like to baptize myself under a new name, a name more like the real me, the one nobody sees."(Cisneros 11). The quote is important because it shoes her sense of belonging, she doesn't have a common name and its hard for her to like it. With her using the verb baptized, it is a more powerful statement other than her just saying she would rather change her name. She wants more than a name change, she wants a change in life, to just have a fresh slate to be herself and be able to represent the real her.

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In "Boys and Girls" and "A Rice Sandwich" Esperanza does not feel like she belongs. Here, the gray figure is Esperanza to represent her feeling of not belonging.

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With society being the way it is, ever changing it is nice to have some kind of constant. Esperanza wants the constant to be a best friend, we see early her wanting a real friend and not just her siblings. I understand this to some extent, as i remember as a kid becoming tired after only having my siblings for a while. I began looking in every direction and was grateful to fall upon the people I did. Esperanza is also just looking and eventually finds the people she wants to be her best friends. Many struggle to find the right people., including her as a young-in The crowd you surround yourself with is hat shapes you, and we find that out the hard way sometimes.

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Esperanza seems to symbolize a lot of children her age. She seems very sociable, and tries to be friends with everyone she meets. I think many people can relate to her. Who didn't want to have a lot of friends and talk to a lot of people. She spends much of the book thinking about how she wants to have a best friend. She wants to know that she is not alone and belongs.

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How would you react if one of your friends does something against your morals?

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How would you react if one of your friends does something against your morals?

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How would your friendship be altered by such a reaction?

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In the vignette "Our Good Day" Esperanza says "but I don't care, I have two new friends and a bike too" (Cisneros 15) shortly after Cathy leaves. I think this line specifically show how mature Esperanza really is. She seems to realize that she should not have been friends with Cathy, because of things like how judgemental she is, and starts to make friends with people she actually likes. She spends time with the two girls and enjoys herself and feel a feeling of belonging with them.

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This graphic shows the relationships that Esperanza attempted to have, and how those relationships failed.

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I relate to the struggle Esperanza deals with when looking for friends that care about her. Its interested to see this concept written in a novel when its such a relatable topic. Its difficult to make friends, especially in a new place, like moving to a new school or a new neighborhood. Social situations can be hard to navigate. Its also difficult to tell if people are "faking" their reactions to you out of politeness or if they actually like you. I find the social world a very difficult place to navigate, and sometimes even hostile.

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Hank Green discusses the negative effects of loneliness. One of these are hypervigilance, which, if you look closely at Esperanza's actions, there is a connection between her lack of friends and her personality. How dangerous is loneliness really, uploaded by SciShow Phych, November 2019

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Kathy shares her own experience of being in a new place when she was young and not feeling like she belonged, similarly to how Esperanza did not feel like she belonged. Kathy shares her recommendations on how to feel like you belong somewhere.
Vinokurov Kathy. "Challenging the perception of belonging." TED, uploaded by TED, October 2014, https://www.ted.com/talks/kathy_vinokurov_challenging_the_perception_of_belonging#t-575286.

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What happens when you're Russian, grow up in Israel and work for an international pharmaceutical company in Germany? You end up with a multinational background that may be difficult for your peers to understand or relate to on a personal level.