Eleven

Mrs. Price is the antagonist of this story. As a presumably white, middle-aged teacher, Mrs. Price holds inherent power over Rachel and the classroom. Although Sylvia Saldivar has no more credibility than Rachel, Mrs. Price chooses to believe Sylvia over Rachel, even insisting that she has seen Rachel wear the sweater. That Mrs. Price so easily accepts Sylvia’s false claim suggests she has preconceived notions about Rachel, whether due to implicit or explicit bias.

Rachel, who knows the sweater is not hers and never was, immediately recognizes the injustice in this: Mrs. Price’s word is law for no other reason than the fact that “she’s older and the teacher” (Paragraph 10). She then exerts this authority by forcing Rachel to wear the sweater, disregarding Rachel’s voice and emotional distress. In several ways, Mrs. Price fails in her role as teacher. If she is indeed a white woman teaching a class of immigrants, then she may be upholding negative social stereotypes about them. Either way, this much is certain: Mrs. Price ignores Rachel’s voice rather than amplifying it, and Rachel’s resulting breakdown shows the harm that can arise when adults wield their authority so callously.

Rachel’s ethnic background is never explicitly stated, but her loving and supportive family mirrors the strong family bonds often seen in Cisneros’s work. Rachel’s family consists of a mother and father, as well as unnamed others, suggesting a traditional family structure. In Cisneros’s work, which often draws on her own life experience as a daughter of Mexican immigrants, the traditional family is often either a beacon of strength or, conversely, part of some broader (often patriarchal) oppressive structure. Though they are mentioned only briefly, Rachel’s parents clearly fit into the traditional heteropatriarchal family structural; her mother is the one baking the cake, while her father is the one coming home from work, and the celebration will begin when he arrives.

Rachel does not comment on this gendered division of responsibilities at home; rather, she thinks of her parents to calm herself and to escape the injustice she experiences at school. She clings to the idea that her family will lavish her with love on this important day, her birthday. However, from a rhetorical perspective, Rachel’s family is little more than an illusion. Though they are present in her thoughts, and though she draws on their love for strength, Rachel ultimately stands alone in the classroom. This reflects the harsh reality of growing up: Every child must learn to grow beyond their family, to stand on their own as an individual. In this battle, Rachel is “defeated,” but the story is at its core a reflection on age. On this particular day, she is “eleven, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, four, three, two, and one” (Paragraph 21). In other words, she is the sum total of all her years and experiences, and this single incident is just one bad day on the long journey to independence.