Response Essay ' Everyday Use ' By Alice Walker

“Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, is a story of a black family composed of a mother and her two daughters: Maggie and Dee. Walker does an excellent job illustrating her characters. There are all types of characters in this short story from round to static. Dee is a flat character, yet Walker uses Dee’s character to warn people of what might happen if they do not live properly. Walker describes Dee’s character as arrogant and selfish, and through Dee’s character one is allowed to perceive the wicked effect of an egotistical world.

The plot, or basic storyline, of this short story is about a black woman, Annie Johnson, based in the United States before 1905. Her marriage had collapsed due to her husband leaving her to pursue religion in Oklahoma and leaving her with very little money. The plotline develops on to show her struggle to support herself and her two sons and how she has to use courage to support herself and her family.

“Everyday Use” demonstrates real life struggles during the period is was written and published (1973), by using historical criticism, we can see that people are often disconnected due to their education. Alice Walker successfully shows the disconnection of heritage value by having one character well-educated and young, and another character who was not able to get an education and is much older. Taking the historical context, plays a major role in the way this short story is viewed. It was a time where people of color had a different and difficult experiences getting an education. The narrator was talking about not being able to get an education, so it was important her daughter get an education; The narrator wanted to be on a television show with her daughters to demonstrate how successful she became. However Dee the narrator's daughter sees her mother and Maggie her sister differently as if they do not know how to appreciate things for their valuable history. One example is, when she wanted the quilts that were suppose to go to Maggie; Dee gets upset that she cannot have them and her mother does not understand why she wants to put them on display.

When analyzing Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use,” tells a story about a mother’s internal conflict with her two daughters, which later depicts the struggle of accepting one’s true ancestries and heritage. The setting of this short story is set in the 1970s when African Americans were struggling to find their personal identities and establish themselves a culture. As Mama, the

The examination of black women's need to keep their powerful heritage and identity is important to the protagonist in “Everyday Use.” Walker uses the mother’s voice to show the trials and tribulations of a small African American family located in the South. She speaks on multiple levels, voicing the necessity and strength of being true to one's roots and past; that heritage is not just something to talk about, but to live and enjoy in order for someone to fully understand themselves. Unlike Kincaid, Walker gives her black female character’s an identity of their own, each in their own right, and observes the internal conflicts of each mother and daughters struggle with identity. The mother represents a simple content way of life where identity and heritage are valued for both its usefulness, as well as its personal significance. In order to illustrate how the mother viewed identity versus her daughters, Walker quickly acknowledges that the mother has inherited many customs and traditions from her ancestors. She describes herself as a large big-boned woman with rough man-working hands (485). She also describes here various abilities including, killing and cleaning a hog as mercilessly as a man. Being able to work hard and not care about being such a lady, is how the mother defines identity at this point. On the other hand, the two daughters each have opposing views on the value and worth of the different items

The essay "In Search of Our Mother's Gardens" by contemporary American novelist Alice Walker is one that, like a flashbulb, burns an afterimage in my mind. It is an essay primarily written to inform the reader about the history of African American women in America and how their vibrant, creative spirit managed to survive in a dismal world filled with many oppressive hardships. This piece can be read, understood, and manage to conjure up many emotions within the hearts and minds of just about any audience that reads it. However, Walker targets African American women in today's society in an effort to make them understand their heritage and appreciate what their mothers and grandmothers endured to

   Historically, the job of women in society is to care for the husband, the home, and the children. As a homemaker, it has been up to the woman to support the husband and care for the house; as a mother, the role was to care for the children and pass along cultural traditions and values to the children. These roles are no different in the African-American community, except for the fact that they are magnified to even larger proportions. The image of the mother in African-American culture is one of guidance, love, and wisdom; quite often the mother is the shaping and driving force of African-American children. This is reflected in the literature of the

In the story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, we are shown that heritage is one of the most important issues that embodies where an individual derived. This story exemplifies not only the representation of heritage but also divides the difference between what heritage means and what it may be viewed to be. Throughout the story, it exposes an African-American family living in a small home and struggling financially. Three women are described in this short story, two sisters, and their mother. One of the sisters is named Maggie, and the other is named Dee.

There are two very different settings in Gloria Naylor’s “Mama Day”. Both settings happen to be characterized by the ideas and culture of the people who inhabit the different places, both being located in America. Throughout “Mama Day” Naylor tells a story of two African Americans, that are in love, from different backgrounds. Cocoa who was born in Willow Springs, an island that is not considered part of the United States and that is not part of South Carolina nor Georgia, was raised by two female figures and George, an orphan who grew up in a program controlled by whites. As Naylor tells the story of the relationship between the two characters, the reader begins to realize the issue of maintaining the identity of African Americans. In Gloria

The central theme of the story “Everyday Use” written by Alice Walker is a mother’s quarrelsome relationship with her two daughters concerning the significance of their heritage. Specifically, this story argues that the youngest daughter’s practical family traditions and values are more important than the oldest daughter’s insincere understanding of their historical African-American oppression as determined by the revolutionary civil rights movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The rightful ownership of two handmade heirloom quilts becomes the object of Mama’s internal struggle in deciding whether her youngest daughter’s love and respect for their family’s heritage is more important than her oldest daughter’s showy display of their African-American

“Everyday Use” is a short story written by Alice Walker, an African American author and activist. The story is told in the first person point of view. The author uses “I” throughout the story making it clear that the story is coming from a first person point of view. The narrator that is telling the story is a mom of two daughters, Maggie and Dee (Wangero). We are never given the name of the narrator.

What would you do, if your eldest daughter came back to town, and completely disrespected you and her younger sibling? This is what Mama had to face in Alice Walker’s, ‘Everyday Use’. In this fiction short story, the story is told from the point of view from the main character, Mama. Readers soon discover that Mama is a colored female, living in the 1960’s, oppressed by whites. The eldest daughter, Dee, is one of the main contributors to the conflict in the story. However, the biggest contributors that help build the story, ‘ Everyday Use’ are, heritage, the setting of the 60’s, and the characters.

Culture is an element of our being that follows us where ever we go. From an early age we began witnessing and leaning mentalities and activities that stick with us through our life span and make up the moral fibers of who we are. Through the story “Everyday Use”, author Alice Walker paints a vivid picture of cultural interaction among an African American household who faced some challenges within their family. By using the family in the story as a buffer to translate her intended message and connect with her audience, Walker is able to showcase how cultural aspects among the African American community varies per generation and led to the advancement in areas of education, politics, and religion.

In her short story “Everyday Use,” Alice Walker takes up what is a recurrent theme in her work: the representation of the harmony as well as the conflicts and struggles within African-American culture. “Everyday Use” focuses on an encounter between members of the rural Johnson family. This encounter––which takes place when Dee (the only member of the family to receive a formal education) and her male companion return to visit Dee’s mother and younger sister Maggie––is essentially an encounter between two different interpretations of, or approaches to, African-American culture. Walker employs characterization and symbolism to highlight the difference between these interpretations and ultimately to uphold one of them, showing that culture

One of the most important aspects about Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” is the presence of the African American heritage. Before reading “Everyday Use”, the knowledge of the term Recovery literature is important. Recovery literature is a time that writers used their stories to represent the African American heritage, recalling aspects of slavery and the tight-knit communities of the rural south. Once realizing this, we further understand the true meaning behind “Everyday Use”. “Everyday Use” is about the Johnson family and most importantly Dee or Wangero as she is later called. We find that Dee know wants to represent her African heritage, but it truly is not her true heritage she is representing. She likes the idea of heritage and through her actions, we see that she has no means of continuing the common practices. In this story, the conflict of the butter churn, dasher, and quilts come into play about the Johnson