Sandra Cisneros And Only Daughter: Sharing One Part Of Identity

There comes a phase in life when one feels disconnected or unaccepted by their family and others.For some it's finding their true selves during teenage and while others its coping with themselves during mid life crisis There is a difference of how you perceive yourself and how others perceive you. As humans, we as a whole need require acceptance from our parents and want them to feel happy for us and acknowledge us for our identity. It's an essential human instinct to need to feel love and acknowledgment from the individuals who we appreciate the most. The essay, 'Only Daughter,' by Sandra Cisneros, shows how a parent's absence of acknowledgment and support and perception of an individual can intercross with their self perception and can shape an individual's life. Cisneros utilizes writing techniques, for example, emotion, specified vocabulary, and irony to exhibit how her trying to overcome a confined childhood influenced her from multiple points of view.

Sandra Cisneros grew up as one daughter amongst six brothers in an ethnic family. She was the little girl encompassed by six brothers who often overlooked her for being the single sister. Clearly in result of the current societal gender expectations they secluded her since they were too embarrassed to be seen hanging out with a girl in the neighbourhood. Sandra Cisneros needed to battle to make a name for herself in the family. Since the beginning, she experienced the significance of dejection. Cisneros underlines all through the story how disconnected she felt cause of her family. Her dad went talking about his seven children would tell people that, 'I have seven children' (pg 904 pp.6). Without the intention to hurt her, her father's perception of not mentioning his only daughters significance still negatively affected her mentally. Cisneros says, 'He didn't mean anything by that mistranslation, I'm sure. But somehow i could feel myself getting erased ' (pg 904 pp.7). Sandra Cisneros implies when she says that it was a 'mistranslation.' In the Spanish language, the term, ‘hijos’, can translate to 'sons' or 'children.' When Cisneros' dad stated, 'siete hijos', he meant to say seven children, however Cisneros spent her childhood isolated and rejected by her family and she took the phrase in the wrong context feeling as if she was insulted. Despite the fact that this disheartened her, Cisneros utilized her rejection by furthering her potential benefit. Cisneros utilizes her seclusion as an opportunity to flourish as a writer.