gendered expectations. In an article focused on the role of high heels in the text, Lilijana Burcar argues that Cisneros offers a "critical dissection" of the role that such attributes of femininity play in constructing young women's self-image. It is argued that high heels do not only constrain women's feet but also constrain their role in society. Esperanza and her friends are given high heels to wear as part of an unofficial rite of initiation into their community, and society. We see this in the vignette entitled "The Family of Little Feet," which tells of a mother who introduces her daughters to high heels, leaving the girls with an initial glee, as if they were Cinderella. Yet this is also described as a horrifying experience for one of the girls, for she feels like she is no longer herself, that her foot is no longer her foot, as the shoe almost dissociates the woman from her body. And yet, as Burcar observes, "presented with a lesson on what it means to be a grown-up woman in American contemporary patriarchal society, the girls decide to cast away their high-heeled shoes." Burcar expresses Esperanza Cordero's life as one of being the “antidote” to the predestined lives lived by the other female characters. Women that have dreams but due to their circumstances and the vicious cycle of domestication forces of a patriarchal society they are confined to the same destiny of the women that came before them. A destiny that is centered in being a full-time wife, mother, in the home. Esperanza, as a character, is formed outside of those gender norms, she is presented as the only one that rebels. Choosing to set this mainly in the years of prepubescence is important for those are the years where young women are taught to become socially acceptable, they are introduced to high heels, specific forms of behaviors, etc., and like this, at a very young age, they are molded into something that fits with the rules of the community where they are to become completely dependent on a man. This is the case for Esperanza's mother, who is uncommonly knowledgeable for the demographics of women on Mango Street, yet doesn't know how to use the subway. Here, Burcar notes that "the traditional female bildungsroman has played a direct role in endorsing and upholding the cult of domesticity for women and the image of