Rejecting Heritage: Wangero's Greed Illustrated in Walker's, Everyday Use

Dee really doesn't understand her family past, but still, wants to keep them. In the poem, Dee changes her name to Wangero and never knew that she was named after her aunt.This tells you that Dee didn't really care about her family heritage and doesn't know a lot about her heritage.

In the story, a dispute comes about, which was who should receive the grandma’s quilts even though they were already promised to Maggie. Dee argued her sister wouldn’t appreciate the quilts; she would put them to everyday use rather than hang them. Mama explained that was the purpose of the quilts to be used; it held no sentimental value because it was a materialistic thing. At this part of the story, Mama conformed to Maggie’s needs by giving her the quilts instead of obeying Dee’s (Wangero’s) demands as usual.

Dee pulls out two quilts and this is what the mother has to say about them:

A daughter who uses her mother's gifts in contrast to a daughter who preserves them, is far more valuable just like in “Everyday use” by Alice Walker because heritage values can be preserved. From here on, Walker utilizes a prideful tone which later shifts into an authoritative tone by illustrating a proud mother who becomes defensive because of her modern daughter’s opposing views.

Dee on the other hand, represents more of a modern, complex, materialistic way of life. She moves to the city to become educated. She is ashamed of where she comes from. In a letter mama receives, Dee writes “no matter where we ‘choose’ to live, she will manage to come see us” (Walker 281). Furthermore, when she comes home to visit she tells mama that she has changed her name to Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo because “I couldn’t bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me” (Walker 282).

When we are first introduced to Dee, we learn that she no longer wants to be called by her given name but instead she would want to be called ‘Wangero’. Dee comments, “I couldn't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppressed me” (Walker 62). Although Dee may have only known that she was named after Grandma Dee, Mama could have “carried back beyond the Civil War” (Walker 62) the name of her daughter. This offended Mama because it was the beginning of how Dee began to reject her heritage. In addition, Mama also realizes how Maggie acts around Dee because of the way she treats her. When Maggie gives into Dee’s wanting of the blankets, Mama sees that Maggie is hurting and Dee couldnt care less. Mama comments that Maggie answered Dee “like somebody used to never winning anything or having anything reserved for her” (Walker 65). These conflicts lead mama to take a stand against her daughter as well as drawing her closer to Maggie. This showed Dee that she could not just barge into the house and take things she did not even truly know the meaning of. Therefore the reader understands that Dee’s actions led Mama to act differently with both of her children, all for the sake of honoring her heritage and

Dee's inability to accept who she is can be seen as a weakness. Dee has turned her back on a part of her past by taking the Muslim name of "Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo" (412). Her reason for changing her name was because she "couldn't bear it any longer being named after the people who oppress me" (412). Her mother sees the action of the name change as Dee turning her back on her immediate blood relatives. Dee's insecurity concerning her past becomes evident, and her mother sees it as a denial of where she came from. It is as though she would rather claim the name of an unknown slave to that of her aunt and grandmother. Her biggest fear seems to be that by not declaring her heritage, she might someday have to return to the simple life of her mother and sister. Dee uses the

Second, there were some cultural differences, Maggie and Mama lived in a house located in a pasture with animals, and you could tell through Mama's description of Dee that she was more modernized probably a city Girl. When Dee/Wangero came to visit she wore a bright dress with loud colors, bangles and gold earrings. Mama said Dee's dress had so many yellows and oranges it was enough to throw back the sun (109). Maggie wore a pink skirt and red blouse that enveloped her body (107). Dee was an educated woman having graduated from High School. Mama on the other hand never made it past the second grade because the school she attended was closed down in 1927. Mama said that, "Colored asked fewer questions than they do now" referring to why the school closed (109). Circumstances such as age, education, and living arrangements dictated their

Wangero only thinks about herself all the time, now that she has come back she wants everything her mother and sister have. “Out she pecks next with a polaroid.” Wangero thought everything was so “cute and old.” She had to make it known she wasn’t the same person as before. Now she’s more selfish then she has ever been. Dee is a determined individual that makes her best effort to get what she wants. What Dee wants is her reality not the real reality. She wants everything to be different she wants it all her

To clarify, Walker’s narrative focuses on two classes of people: one lower and one higher. In general, Mama and Maggie represent a class that only appreciates practicality, whereas Dee and Hakim-a-barber represent a class that places more value on artistic interest. For example, when Mama asks Dee why she would rather be called Wangero, she explains that “[she] couldn 't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress [her]," (Walker). In effect, Dee’s new and dramatically different name exemplifies how serious she is about defining her identity with her new culture as opposed to remaining in the same culture as her Mama. In other words, Dee has taken the sole purpose of having a name, identity, and added a symbolism to it of her defiance. In another instance, when Dee sees her family’s butter churn, her

Dee shows that she does not value heritage by changing her name to Wangero. She adopts an African name "Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo" and rejects her identity. She tells her mother that the name Dee is dead and that she "couldn't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me". When Dee does speak of her changed name, "it's as if there is not even a tombstone to make the presence of her absence and it is as if her return seems less a return, she appears a curious visitor who has momentarily stopped off a road which began and ends elsewhere". Through heritage, her name was chosen after her aunt and Grandma Dee.

She now seems to be embracing and acknowledging her African roots and disowning her actual family heritage. Upon returning home, Mama, the protagonist, learns that she has changed her name to Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo. This is the first her Mama has heard of this and it causes her to question Dee’s motive for doing so. After all, it appears Dee was named in the family tradition and to Dee’s Mama, her name is symbolic and seems to be a way of recognizing and honoring the women in the family by naming a baby girl of a later generation after their elders. Dee was named after her Mama’s sister, Dicie, who was named after her Grandma Dee, who was named after her mother. (Kirsner and Mandell, 2012, pg. 348). However, to Dee, her name is a symbol of oppression and humiliation and denotes things that she has come to believe are beneath her and her new status in life. She is now a beautiful, educated, and sophisticated woman, who is proud of her newly made self. She now seems to have renounced her past, completely missing the fact that it is her past and her heritage that played an important part of shaping her to be the woman she has become (“Characterization and Symbolism,”

In Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use”, Walker juxtaposes two different daughters in their quest for a cultural identity. The narrator, their mother, talks about how each daughter is different; Dee went off to college and became well-educated, contrary to their impoverished and low status as black women in the south. Meanwhile, Maggie isn’t nearly as educated as Dee is, but is still literate. The entire story centers around Dee’s visit with her new Muslim significant other. The story’s climax is when Dee wants to take two special quilts back home, but those quilts are for Maggie. These precious quilts comprise their culture. Henceforth, Dee does not deserve to take the quilts with her because she has decided to take on a culture that varies significantly from her own and she is already used to getting what she wants.

“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 genuine appreciation of heritage and family is the focus of Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use”. Dee and Maggie’s characters are the vessels that Walker uses to demonstrate the difference between appreciating possessions for their usefulness as well as their personal significance and their contrasting value as a trendy, materialistic connection. There is a palpable difference between Maggie and Dee, both in physical appearance as well as in personality traits and their treatment of the personal artifacts that come into play within the story is very telling of this.