Everyday Use By Alice Walker Analysis

Alice Walker is a well-known African- American writer known for published fiction, poetry, and biography. She received a number of awards for many of her publications. One of Walker's best short stories titled "Everyday Use," tells the story of a mother and her two daughters' conflicting ideas about their heritage. The mother narrates the story of the visit by her daughter, Dee. She is an educated woman who now lives in the city, visiting from college. She starts a conflict with the other daughter, Maggie over the possession of the heirloom quilts. Maggie still lives the lifestyle of her ancestors; she deserves the right of the quilts. This story explores heritage by using symbolism of the daughters' actions, family items, and tradition.

Everyday Use is a short story written by Alice Walker as part of the story collection in the book Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women. The short story is a powerful piece of writing that takes the reader on an insightful journey into the challenges, struggles, and realities of growing up as an African woman. The main issues that are palpable throughout the story are the issues of black consciousness and the stereotypes of rural black African women. I believe that the purpose of the text is to highlight the interconnectedness of the past and the present. The author wants the reader to appreciate the struggles and challenges that Black women faced

“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.

Alice Walker is a writer of many powerful short stories, novels, essays and poetry. She used her work to bring black women’s lives to the main focus, such as the rich and important in the US American Literature. In the short story “Everyday Use” written by Alice walker, she showed the conflicts and struggle throughout the African- American culture. “Everyday Use” addresses the dilemma with African Americans, trying to escape prejudice and poverty. The short story “Everyday Use” focuses on the encounter between a mother and her daughters. The setting of the story takes place in the driveway of the mother’s house. The mother and her youngest daughter Maggie wait for her oldest daughter Dee and her male friend to visit from school. Alice

Alice begins her story with Dee’s mother describing her precious yard. The way the narrator describes this bond shows that the yard is something that she keeps very close to her house and that she’s proud. To Dee’s mother the yard, sort of represents a little quite place that she can think and put her thoughts together. She treats it like a child and makes sure

Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday use” tells the story of a mother and her daughter’s conflicting ideas about their identities and heritage. Mrs. Johnson an uneducated woman narrates the story of the day one daughter, Dee, visits from college. Mrs. Johnson auto-describes herself as a “big-boned woman with rough, man-working hands.”(180,Walker). Contrasting her auto-description, she describes Dee as a young lady with light complexion, nice hair and full figure that “wanted nice things.”(181,Walker). The arrival of Dee to Mrs. Johnson’s house causes mixed emotions on Mrs. Johnson. Dee Johnson and Mrs. Johnson have differing viewpoints on heritage and each value possessions for different reasons. Dee’s superficiality and materialist ways

In the story 'Everyday Use', by Alice Walker, the value of ones culture and heritage are defined as a part of life that should not be looked upon as history but as a living existence of the past. Walker writes of the conflict between two Black cultures. Dee and Maggie are sisters whom do not share the same ideals. Mama is torn between two children with different perspectives of what life truly means. In the story, Walker describes the trial and tribulations of one daughter whose whole life is tormented by fear, failure and weakness; while the other "has held life always in the palm of one hand"(61) and moves to a better lifestyle. The possessions of the past will ultimately change the

The short story “Everyday Use,” by Alice Walker, contains multiple different literary elements. History and heritage play a key role in the development and conclusion of this rather intriguing story. Although history and heritage are important, the driving factors of this story are the literary elements. In particular the elements of symbols, characterization, and point of view in this story are significant.

The short story of “Everyday Use” was written by Alice Walker. Mrs. Johnson is the narrator of the story. In this petite narrative, Mrs. Johnson and her youngest daughter Maggie gets a visit from her oldest daughter Dee who came from college and Mrs. Johnson and Maggie both bear witness to Dee’s change. As Dee is trying to embrace the modern culture in the twentieth-century. Thus, in Alice Walker’s story, Mrs. Johnson’s perspective changes at the end, at first favoring Dee and eventually favoring Maggie instead.

The quilt that the speaker discovers contains earth tone squares. Each of these colors symbolizes a different family member. A single square that is “the yellowbrown of Mama’s cheeks”. The fact that there is a single square of this color shows that the speaker’s mother is unparalleled. The speaker’s father is described as having “burnt umber pride”. The father was a war veteran as revealed in the first stanza when the speaker talks about the “army green” blanket that was given to the speaker’s father by “Supply”. The reason that the father’s color is brown is because he passed away. The brown symbolizes his burial plot. When the speaker talks about having a brown father and yellow mother this also tells of their skin tones. The

The short story, “Everyday Use”, was written by Alice Walker. She has a well-known reputation worldwide from being a novelist, poet, short story writer, activist and feminist. Many of Walkers writings discuss issues facing African Americans. For her short story, “Everyday Use”, Walker focuses points on African Americans lacking understanding for their heritage. She uses a quilt as a symbol of heritage for her characters, Mama, Maggie and Dee.

n the short story "Everyday Use," by Alice Walker, a mother and one of her daughters argue over who should get some old quilts. The quilts are valuable to the family, made from clothing family members wore, going as far back as the Civil War. While who gets the quilts seems most important, there is actually a character who gains more by the end of the story. The mother starts the story feeling unimportant and ignorant, especially in the eyes of her daughter, Dee. But by the end of the story, the mother gains pride and self-respect in a way she never has before.

“Everyday Use” is a short story by Alice Walker, which emphasizes the importance of understanding and cherishing your heritage and the inheritance that may come along with it. Knowing who is truly entitled to the inheritance, and what their heritage meant was the central conflict in the story, when the two main characters Dee and Maggie, both wanted the two hand stitched quilts. Rather than looking at the physical aspect of the quilts the author wants the reader to know that the meaning is much deeper. The quilts are used to depict the struggle, triumphs, oppression, joy, pain, and love of each hand that helped to create the prized works of art. The quilts needed to be put to everyday use, rather than a mere decoration on the wall. Through the quilts Walker was able to show what each character valued: Dee valued the materials things, Maggie, valued things she could attach herself to, and Mama valued the acceptance of her daughter Dee.

The title, "Everyday Use", has a specific meaning that lashes on to the story. When the narrator, Walker

“Everyday Use” is a short story written by a 1940’s black writer, Alice Walker. She did a fantastic job illustrating her characters. There are different types of character in her story from round to static. Her use of clear-cut symbolism prompts the reader to be able to take a deeper look into the characters of the story. When reading this story I felt anger for Dee, while for the narrator and Maggie I felt sympathy.