1. Jonghyun Choe
Period 3
25 September 2011
“My Name”, a vignette from Sandra Cisnero’s novel The House on Mango Street, as well
as Nellie Wong’s autobiographical poem “How a Girl Got Her Chinese Name” both examine the
relationship between one’s name and ones identity, shown by the use of imagery, attitudes
and metaphors throughout the stories. Although the narrators of the two different pieces feel
quite differently about their names, they both discover and define themselves through their
and others feelings about their names.
In “My Name”, the narrator is a Hispanic girl who only possesses one name. Despite her
names positive meaning in English that means “hope”, both its Spanish meaning “sadness”, and
the history behind it are both negative. The narrator further compares her name to her father’s
songs as “songs like sobbing”. It seems like the first paragraph of vignette is trying to show how
the narrator rather dislikes her name as she thinks of the meanings of her name that are tied to
herself.
In the second paragraph, the narrator tells of the origin of her name, which she got from
her great grandmother. The narrator describes her great grandmother as a “horse woman” (7),
which reveals that her great grandmother had a strong personality. The narrator further talks
about the background of her name, by saying that she would’ve liked to have known her great
grandmother, describing her as a “wild horse of a woman” (13). This shows the respect narrator
has towards her great grandmother as a person. However, the narrator adds on by saying that

2. she does not admire the life her great grandmother had, like a “fancy chandelier” (16). It is
evident in this paragraph that the narrator is curious about the origins of her name. By going
back and forth in different tenses, this demonstrates how the narrator seeks her identity with
the name she has. The result of this is again is in two-fold. The narrator respects her great
grandmother who had the same name as her as a person, but she does not want to “inherit her
place by the window” (22). This seems to be demonstrating how the narrator is scared of
having to live a life where she would be trapped by men just like her great grandmother, which
is causing the narrator to become confused with where exactly she belongs to.
On the next paragraph, the narrator again talks about the different feelings she has
towards her name “Esperanza”, in Spanish and English. She says that when her name is said in
English, it sounds as if “the syllables were made out of tin and hurt the roof of your mouth” (24).
This use of mixed imagery clearly contrasts to earlier when the narrator says on the first
paragraph how her name means “hope”. In same manner, the narrator describes the sound of
her name in Spanish rather like a “softer something, like silver, not quite as thick as sister’s
name- Magdalena” (25). These mixed imagery used by the narrator contrasts between the real
meanings of the name “Esperanaza” to the actual feeling narrator experiences that seems to
create the confusion in discovering her identity in regards to her name.
Towards the end of the vignette, the narrator says that she is “always Esperanza” (27),
and then she mentions how she desires to “baptize under a new name” (28) such as “Zeze the
X”(29) someday. The narrator has a tone of resignation towards her current name, and she
definitely wishes to have a name that will feel “more like the real” herself. Esperanza clearly has
a positive attitude at the end of the vignette although her confusion and negative feelings

3. towards her current name, and it is evident that she thinks the names are important to define
one’s personality and trait.
In the narrative poem “How a Girl Got Her Chinese Name”, the narrator is a Chinese
originated girl who is given with various names throughout the story. The poem starts with the
teacher asking the narrator, “What do your parents call you at home?” (2). When the narrator
tells the teacher that her name is “Nellie”, the teacher “stressed the l’s, whinnying like a horse”
(5), then gives the narrator a new name “Nah Lei”, which means “Where or Which Place” (8).
The narrator does not really care about the meaning of the name she is given, and she instead
just practices “writing Nah Lei” over and over in order to get used to the new name.
In the next stanza, we see that the narrator comes home and tells her parents about her
new name given. The narrator’s parents are very unhappy with the name “Nah Lei”, saying
“Nah Lei? Where? Which Place?” (17) and then gives the narrator a “Chinese name”, “Lai Oy”.
Unlike the narrator from “My Name”, Nellie seems to have jubilant attitudes towards her
changed names, because she does not question herself where the names originated from.
Instead, the narrator “giggled” as she thought of her Chinese name, knowing that “Lai Oy could
also mean lost pocket” as well as “Beautiful Love”.
It is clear that unlike Esperanza, the narrator of “How a Girl Got Her Chinese Name” is
feeling much more comfortable with the name “Lai Oy”. This is shown on the eighth stanza
where the narrator now “pulls out the pocket” at school, where she feels rather positive than
negative like Esperanza. However, the ending of both stories contrast greatly. While
Esperanza’s attitude towards her name shifts from being negative to positive throughout the
story, “How a Girl Got Her Chinese Name” ends with Nellie saying “Between these names I

4. never knew I would ever get lost” (36-37).
Both narrators face fear and they do not know where exactly they belong to culturally.
The fear faced by Esperanza is the fear of becoming tied to the heritage; she “doesn’t want to
inherit her place by the window” and because of this, she desires to have a new name and live
an entirely new life where she can become free. On the other hand, Nellie is scared for the
opposite reason. Her name is not tied by heritage, but the names “Nah Lei” and “Lai Oy” are
merely the ones given by her parents and teacher without any connections to Nellie’s identity
with the meaning. This causes Nellie to become confused from discovering who she really is
and she does not exactly know where she belongs truly.
Both pieces are similar because both narrators are in situations where they are
bicultural and they are both frightened and do not exactly know where they truly belong to.
However these pieces contrast because the reasons for these feelings felt by the narrators are
opposite and they have different attitudes towards the meaning of their names.