How A Quilt Helps Your Body And Comfort The Soul

The both stories give you a clear understanding of what the characters think about the quilts and why they're so important.The main idea behind the quilts is to let the reader know what the characters have been through and what memories were formed in their lives.In “Everyday Use”, The quilt was made from their grandma's old dress and the grandpa army uniform. In “My Mother Pieced Quilts”, the mom used old dresses and nightgowns.The Daughter reflects on her mother's memories when she runs down and up of the quilt.There are sculptures of their family and in the quilt, there's death and life, love.The quilt becomes a

During the early period of the early 19th century, women came to the mills of their own accord, for various reasons: to help a brother pay for college, for the educational opportunities offered in Lowell, or to earn a supplementary income for themselves. While their wages were only half of what men were paid, they became free from the controlling dozens of fathers and husbands which at first seemed to be a positive experience. As a result, while factory life would soon come to be experienced as oppressive, it enabled these women to challenge assumptions of female inferiority. The young working girls endured hard work hours, low wages, and spoor living conditions. For example, their working conditions of long hours on average of at least twelve to thirteen hours per day were rigid conditions for these young women. The low wages and harsh living conditions can take a psychological toll on the women. As told in her own story, “Amelia”, a working girl who used a pen name described her opinion of factory life. She said “receives therefrom a Regulation paper, containing the rules by which she must be governed while in their employ: and lo! Here is the beginning of mischief: for in addition to the tyrannous and oppressive rules which meet her astonished eyes she finds herself compelled to remain for the space of twelve months…in fact, constituting herself a slave, a

On viewing her work, I am reminded of the traditional art of quilt making, an art once dismissed as “women’s work” but reevaluated by the Pattern and Decoration movement during the second wave of feminism during the 1970’s. Historically quilt makers have used its qualities to communicate political and social messages. For example, the Abolition quilts made during the US Civil war era were inscribed with messages decrying the evils of slavery. However, Gower uses the repetitions of the motifs and tessellations of quilt making practice to draw attention to the excesses of mass

However, not only did women work in the fields they also produce goods, and services; such as clothing, personal hygiene items, and food to be sold in order to build -up their coffer’s through that of their overabundance of supplies. This impact took place during the 1700’s and beyond, when women from all aspects of life filled these domestic jobs while working for very little pay; getting absolutely nothing at all for their work. During the 1800’s, however, this all changed for women and soon these women we’re categorized as being unskilled workers this causing tremendous consequences for these women; especially when the men return for war and once again took on the gender roles to which women were now a custom too.

Women’s history in the United States has always been represented as a struggle for rights. Wealth and status were tied to either their fathers or husbands. In the early 1900s, women were afforded the traditional roles of society. The majority of women worked in the home. If they were of the 18% young or poor women, they also worked in factories as laborers, manufacturing items for the booming industrial revolution (U.S. Department of Labor, 1980). During this time period the workplace was not in compliance with current safety standards. There was no minimum wage yet, work conditions were horrible and they worked long hours, “In 1900, the average workweek in manufacturing was 53 hours,” (Fisk, 2003). Women took “pink

physically and mentally, quilting has acted as an art that transcends racial barriers and to bring

With the center of production moving from households to mass-production, women in America had to alter their way of life. A great number of women followed labor opportunities to the mills, factories, and workshops. For the first time in history, large numbers of women left their homes to participate in the public world. “Mill Girls” were typically young, unmarried women who lived together in boarding houses provided by the factory for which they worked. Lucy Larcom recalls,

They seeked to work with men in various different trades, professions. and commerce [Document 7]. In addition to women changing the American industrial landscape, manufacturing revolutionized it. At the beginning of the time period, artisanship was mainly how people manufactured goods. They would use their skill from the comfort of their home, with their family [Document 5]. Rising out of innovation, however, was the birth of large manufacturing plants [Document 5]. This produced a cheaper, and faster way to manufacture products; at the expense of weaker, more limited and dependent workers [Document 2]. With this new work class coming to lead the American industrial system, it increased inequality between the worker, and the

Quilting can also be used for expression of oneself or for social commentary. Back in the 1800’s when there were many wars women would usually make quilts because they were what was needed in those times and the fabric was often hard to come by and it was usually saved for clothes making.” It was a means to escape from the isolation of their lifestyle and it allowed them the artistic freedom to express themselves. The quilts produced by our ancestors told stories about their lifestyles that could not be captured by pen and paper. Every quilt we see today, regardless of when the quilt was made, relates a story. The types of fabrics, the design of the quilt, the signature of the quilter, all reveal an intimate story of the woman or man who made the quilt.” (Meeske,Quilt Me a Story) They used quilting to get out of the bleakness and horrible things that were going on in their lives at the moment and put how they felt in the quilts. Around the mid-1800’s women quilted a lot more to show artistic talent, political views, and even their emotions. “Prior to a woman’s ability to vote, some women used their artistic talents and expressed their political views through a quilt. The issue of slavery in the United States in the mid-1800s led to quilt patterns called Slave Chain

The quilts are used in the representation of what heritage means to Mama and Maggie versus Dee’s view of them. Mama describes that:

In the story, a family heirloom becomes a conflict because while Dee wants to take the quilt to decorate her home, Maggie would make better use of the quilts by using them instead of framing them. This quilt that has been passed down from generation to generation, is symbolic of the love that both the older generations and the present generation has for each other. The quilt also symbolizes the strength of the family and the stitching is symbolic of the bonds that hold a family together. Mama ultimately decides that the quilt will go to Maggie because Dee does not understand the practicality of the quilt which is that they were from pieces of clothes that were lived in, which represented their past. Alice Walker was also emphasizing that it is the woman in the family that have held and currently hold families together by depicting closeness of the female relationships.

History and the wide variety cultures has altered the way women quilt. Quilts in Colonial America resembled their culture and lands from which the quilters had come from. The wealthy and social prominent settlers in the south began to make patchwork quilts after the middle class and poor women had been working on patchwork for hundreds of years. The Puritans brought sturdy fabrics and simple designs, and in northeastern America the colors were more colorful. Linsey-woolsey, also known as woolen bedcovers were not often made as a staple within the household.

The maternal instinct and family affection is woman's most holy attribute, but if she enters industrial life, that is not enough. She must supplement her family conscience by a social and an industrial conscience. She must widen her family affection to embrace the children of the community. She is wrecking havoc in the sewing-trades, because with the meager equipment sufficient for family life she has entered industrial life (Addams 57).

What Dee failed to realize was that the quilts she wanted were in fact a part of their family’s heritage. Each quilt was made with with parts of clothing from different family members and sown together to show their importance in the family and also for remembrance of who they all

Culturally, the symbolism of a quilt is understood to be an heirloom piece that is closely guarded and highly prized. The ownership of the quilt and the generational lines it passes down is known before the piecing is begun. Stitching the pieces together is done by groups of women. The tiny bits of cloth each carry a memory, one from grandpa's shirt, one square from an aunt's Christmas dress, a piece from the flannel nightgown a mother wore as she pulled her sick child close to her bosom. The pieces are carefully and artistically pieced together into a collage of