The novel Caramelo, by Sandra Cisneros, is full of lively storytelling. Cisneros uses a predominant symbol to tie the threads of her story together: the caramel-colored rebozo, or silk shawl, that her grandmother gave her. Through this symbol, we come to see the story, "bits of string, odds and ends found here and there, embroidered together to make something new" (Cisneros Disclaimer), a fine piece of handmade work to be handed down to following generations, as well-woven and significant as a physical heirloom.
Awful Grandmother's grandmother wove the rebozo using skills rarely found in modern days. These Mexican shawls range in quality, from the utilitarian style of rough, un-dyed cotton the poorest women carry their infants in, to the finest threads of silk. "Caramelo describes one of the latter variety, the word defining the golden tan flecked with black and white that brings to mind the sweet of the same name" (Randall, n.p.). The word caramelo takes on a deeper meaning in the story, symbolic of more than just the shawl, just as the shawl becomes a symbol as well.
Candelaria, the laundry girl in Awful Grandmother's house in Mexico City, is the first person Lala sees "with skin the color of a caramelo" (Cisneros 34). She describes it as "burnt-milk candy" (Cisneros 34), the way she describes other people's skin in rich colorful language: "the coffee-with-too-much-milk color like me, [...] the fried-tortilla color of the washerwoman [...]" (Cisneros 34). Though Lala thinks Candelaria is beautiful, "with too many teeth like white corn and black hair" (Cisneros 34-35), she is shamed into shunning her, the reason being (as she think at that moment) a case of head lice that Lala contracts from Candelaria.
The word caramelo is thus introduced early in the story, signifying the importance of skin color in Mexican and Mexican-American culture. In a society that highly values a light skin color, this girl, a Native mix, ...