Everyday Use Theme

Walker entertains African Americans and Americans about the relationship between these two sisters and their mother. One daughter is named Maggie and she stays at home with her mother and help her with the chores around the house. She was also burnt in a house fire so she does not het out much. “Mamma”, has another daughter, Dee. Dee is very beautiful, and outgoing and really completely opposite of Maggie. Dee leaves home and experience life for her own, and becomes a pro black person. When Dee comes back she wants things from here house to treat them as artifacts at her own home. Especially this quilt. Dee wanted it, but the mother wouldn’t allow it. She wanted Maggie to have it. Maggie kept this quilt and Dee left, but not without talking

In the short story “Everyday Use,” by Alice Walker shows us a family of Mama,and her two daughter’s Dee, and Maggie are all very different. This story is a perfect reminder to “not judge a book by it is cover”because people are not what they always seem to be. People have different traits that make everyone unique and diverse. For example, Maggie goes to show that you can come from different backgrounds but have such a different appearance, words, and actions than others.

Dee has developed a passion for superiority over everyone, including her own mother. "She wrote me once that no matter where we "choose" to live, she will manage to come see us. But she will never bring her friends" (Walker 1). Maggie on the other hand, is "...nervous until after her

In the story “Everyday Use” Alice Walker shows how different ideas, decisions and thoughts help contribute to the way a person is. Mama, Dee and Maggie are all alike in a lot of different ways, at the same time they are different in many ways also. In this story, Mama, Maggie & Dee (Wangero) have a conflict which is resolved at the end of the story. This story also shows us how the things we value help shape who we are. Maggie has always felt a specific way about Dee (Wangero), She has always felt that Dee (Wangero) has always gotten what she wants.

In the short story, “Everyday Use,” Alice Walker introduces three contrasting characters: Mama, Dee, and Maggie. Each character expresses different personalities, which reflect on each other throughout the story. As an underprivileged family, their uniqueness unfolds highlighting the pros and cons of the individuals. Overbearing and bossy, Dee is a polar opposite of Maggie, who is withdrawn and isolated. Absent of a father figure, Mama manages to raise these two children to the best of her ability with limited amount of resources.

Most people want their family to be a source of love and care; however, conflicts can occur when one family member has different values from the rest. Throughout Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use," she shows how education affects family dynamics. Walker describes Dee as having hatred towards her family and their values before receiving a higher education. Education not only separated Dee from a true sense of herself, but she also lose a sense of heritage and morals that can only be taught by one's family. Although Mama struggled and only obtained a second-grade education, she still found it important to send Dee off to college.

Dee was looked upon from Mama and Maggie. In one part of the story it described a dream Mama had in great detail about her and dee being on TV dressed really pretty with the appearance of money. I believe Dee’s motivation was quite different from Maggie’s. Dee thrived to be the “perfect child” and wanted to impress anybody and everybody around her. When it came down to Dee and family heritage she believed she got whatever she wanted, which was mostly true until she tried to get the quilts made by Maggie and her grandma.

Maggie reveres Dee and sees her in a place that is unobtainable for herself. Maggie’s introverted, quiet, subservient character reflects the treatment the family heritage receives from Wangero. She is silencing and suppressing her familial heritage out of her life. Maggie represents the family heritage because both are disrespected, unacknowledged, and devalued by Wangero. Wangero even insults Maggie’s intelligence when she states, “‘ She’d probably be backward enough to put [the quilts] to everyday use’” (477).

“Everyday Use” tells a story about a single mother who puts her all into raising her two daughters “Dee (Wangero)’” and “Maggie”. Alice Walker; the author, explains how heritage and diversity in culture cannot be changed. This short story describes the significance of: family, traditions, and the unity being passed on no matter how you’ve been brought up. Maggie and Dee both have personalities that contradict each other. Maggie is more timid and soft-spoken, meanwhile Dee (Wangero) is more courageous and fearless.The narrator in the story is mama, mama is a very plain and quiet women. Mama does express her opinion throughout the story but only in times where her daughters depend on her.

Alice Walker’s work, “Everyday Use” is about a girl named Dee who hated her life growing up in poverty and had her mind set on getting out of that lifestyle and getting an education. Ever since she was little she despised her life in poverty and felt that she deserved living in a better environment. When she grew up she practically disowned her family; changing her name and treating them as if she was a tourist when she visited.

In the short story "Everyday Use" which was written by Alice Walker's was a story that was revealed in the eyes and of the narrator “Mama”. Mama speaks of her family which is made up of two grown daughters. Maggie still lives with her mother and Dee lives away with her boyfriend named is Hakim A Barber. Through the eyes of two daughters, Dee and Maggie, has lived there life in different ways. From the beginning to the end of this short story there are several themes that keep appearing throughout the short story. The themes should be that the family is very dismayed and not as close. It also showed the shame the sisters had towards each other when Maggie was awaiting the arrival of her sister Dee. It states “Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in corners homely ashamed of the burns scars down her arms and legs, eyeing her sister with a mixture of envy and awe.”

These two sisters were raised alike yet differently. There is a fine distinction between the two. Maggie was different from Dee in that she wasn’t handed things to her in life and when it came to Dee, “That, ‘no’ is a word the world never learned to say to her (Walker 315). This statement shows the feelings that Maggie had towards her sister. She knew that her sister was beautiful, intelligent, and spoiled. Maggie became jealous of her sister. Maggie knew that she had strengths of her own, but she it covered under the shadow of Dee. Walker created Dee to be an character he despised Maggie. Cowart says “Walker focuses the reader’s growing dislike for the heroine in her indifference to Maggie, the pathetic sister she seeps prepare to ignore in a kind of moral triage” (?). It is clear that Dee hated Maggie. The reason being for Dee hating Maggie could be simply because she is not as educated as her. Dee states “Maggie’s brain Is like elephant’s” (Walker 319). This implies that the Dee did not take Maggie seriously. Dee is not kind towards her sister. Walker creates this negative relationship between the two sisters. Dee continues throughout the story to belittle Maggie. In the instance when Dee wanted to take the quilts for her own, she states that “Maggie can’t appreciate the quilts” (?). It’s interesting to see how negatively Dee is towards Maggie, creates Maggie into a strong woman. Even though Maggie

Maggie is a very nervous and awkward person. She can be perceived as antisocial and in some ways it hides her beautiful personality and generous

Now if Dee were telling the story, it would be a little different it would be more like this. As she steps out the car the reader can tell she is very happy and in a good mood to see her family. She comes in a loud dress with her hair standing straight on her head like she going to church. When Dee starts walking towards the house Maggie attempts to dash back to the house. Dee might have been thinking that Maggie do not want her back by the way she was acting. Mama said, “Maggie attempts to make a dash for the house, in her shuffling way.” (Walker 3) When the family goes inside and eat dinner, after dinner Dee asks for the quilts. Mama tells her that she was going to give it to Maggie. Mama pleads, “I promise to give them quilts to Maggie, for when she marries John Thomas.” (Walker 6) Dee still begging and asking for the quilts while she is hugging and holding them. Mama snatches the quilts from Dee and hand them to Maggie. Now Dee looks at Mama as the antagonist/bad person because she is the reason why she is not getting the way she wants.

At times it seems that Maggie resents her sister. One quote in particular expresses how Maggie feels around her sister, “Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs, eyeing her sister with a mixture of envy and awe. She thinks her sister has held life always in the palm of one hand, that “no” is a word the world never learned to say to her.” I would say that Maggie has developed an inferiority complex that she continues to struggle with. However, their mother asserting herself and giving the quilts to Maggie, lessens the burden that Maggie carries and ends up smiling at Dee at the end of the story. Dee tries to encourage Maggie by saying “You ought to try to make something of yourself, too, Maggie. It’s really a new day for us. But from the way you and Mama still live you’d never know it.”