In Sandra CisnerosÆ Only Daughter, the author provides us with an account of the isolation and efforts to win her fatherÆs approval in a working-class family of nine, including six brothers and one daughter. As Cisneros writes, ôI was/am the only daughter and only a daughterö (p. 142). This line is significant to my life and CisnerosÆ, because I am Hispanic like Cisneros and in my family, as well as hers, males were favored. Not only were males favored, but females were confined to rigid roles. Like CisnerosÆ father urged her to get an education so she could find a husband, so my father urged me to marry, have children, and settle down. In both my own life and CisnerosÆ, such experiences fuel an inner passion to achieve and gain approval that outweighs any of the negative impact on development from such patriarchal attitudes.
In CisnerosÆ life, her family focused on her brothers. Her father often mistakenly told people, ôI have seven sons,ö making Cisneros feel like she was ôbeing erasedö from existence, (p. 143). Because of this, she found the time and space to focus on her love of reading, thinking, and writing. Despite her occupation and college endeavors, Cisneros secretly ôwooedö her father for his attention, although he seldom, if ever, interrupted her to ask what she was doing or why (p. 143).
Cisneros went to college and majored in English, something her father considered ôsilly,ö and her fatherÆs main purpose in encouraging her to get an education was because college was ôgood for finding a husbandö (p. 142). While her brothers always seemed to gain her fatherÆs favor, becoming doctors and marrying and having children, Cisneros was practically excluded from her family because of her gender and her inability to live up to their rigidly defined roles for women.
Eventually, Cisneros returns home for a visit, after experiencing some success as a writer. Her triumphs in
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