Analysis Of The House On Mango Street, Cathy Queen Of...

In the vignettes â€Å"The House on Mango Street,† â€Å"Cathy Queen of Cats,† and â€Å"A Rice Sandwich,† Sandra Cisneros is trying to portray that socioeconomic classes impact an individual s self-confidence. These three stories tie together an underlying principle about someone s outlook and perspective on their lives based on their living situation. The mix of the characters initial low esteem and the opinions of others upon their socio-economic class the reader can see the effect towards self-confidence. This theme is first introduced to readers through the life of Esperanza. Esperanza speaks her life at home. She mentions that her family moves around each year for various reasons including her parent s inability to pay for rent. She moves into†¦show more content†¦In the vignette â€Å"Cathy Queen of Cats,† the reader is introduced to one of Esperanza s neighbors, Cathy. She is described as a crazy cat lady who is undeservingly living in a low-income region. The socio-economic class that both Cathy and Esperanza are located within impact their confidences and mental health in two different ways. Cathy seems to be obsessed with the idea that she is a distant relative of French royalty. She speaks about living affluently as if she belongs there, but is trapped in a life of less fortune. She expresses this thought to Esperanza who does not understand the background behind this dream of hers. Esperanza describes how â€Å"Cathy’s father will have to fly to France one day and find her great great distant grand cousin on her father s side and inherit the family house† (13). In Cathy’s case, her current socio-economic class is temporary and the obsession with living luxuriously causes her to have a boost of self-confidence that makes her seem conceited. Socioeconomic classes impact Cathy’s self-confidence in a different type of negative way, instead of making her feel secure where she is, it makes her feel like she is better than the other members of her community since she may have wealthy relatives. This idea of overconfidence is expressed by Cathy when she says she will â€Å"just