Alice Walker’s Everyday Use (rpt. in Thomas R. Arp and Greg Johnson, Perrine’s Literature Sound and Structure 11th ed [Boston: Wadsworth, 2012] 166-173) is a short story told by the mother of two daughters, Mama. The story tells the tale of the return of Mama’s oldest daughter, Dee, and the problems that Dee’s return causes for Mama and her youngest daughter, Maggie. This short story includes humor and irony, displays detailed characterization, and portrays a very effective point of view. These three literary elements contribute to this story by giving insight into the past and the true personalities of the characters, and the way the characters have changed over time. Humor and irony play very important roles in Everyday Use. The humor found …show more content…
The irony contributes to the story by adding insight into the way Dee behaved in the past compared to how she behaves now. For a character who hates her home so much, it is very ironic that she comes back and wants to take family heirlooms, such as the butter churn and quilts, home with her to cherish. “ ‘This churn top is what I need… And I want the dasher, too’ ” (171). “ ‘Mama, Wangero said sweet as a bird. Can I have these quilts?’... ‘These are all pieces of dresses Grandma used to wear. She did all this stitching by hand. Imagine!’... ‘Maggie can’t appreciate these quilts!’ She said. ‘She’d probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use.’ … ‘But, they're priceless!’ ” (172). This is situational irony because the reader expects Dee not to want anything from her home because of how much she despised her home and heritage, but she ends up wanting the butter churn and hand-made quilts. She even says that Maggie would not appreciate the quilts and would put them to “everyday use,” as if Dee adores them. It is also ironic that Dee brings Hakim-a-barber home with her. In the story, Mama refers to the time when Dee wrote her a letter saying that wherever Maggie and Mama chose to live, she would come visit them, but she would not bring her friends. “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” (168). Dee was ashamed of her home and family, …show more content…
This point of view contributes to this story is multiple ways. Mama narrating this story helps to give the reader insight into the past of the characters. Mama was there for everything that happened in the lives of her two daughters, Dee and Maggie. She knows their personalities and how they feel about their heritage and lives. As a result of Mama’s knowledge of these important details, Mama is able to add a contrast between the past and the present. Mama is able to tell the reader where Maggie’s burn scars came from, and what she thinks caused the fire. She tells the reader about the house burning, and how differently the two girls reacted to the fire. “How long ago was it that the house burned? Ten, twelve years? Sometimes I can still hear the flames and feel Maggie’s arms sticking to me, her hair smoking and her dress falling off her in little black papery flakes. Her eyes seemed stretched open, blazed open by the flames reflected in them. And Dee. I see her standing off under the sweet gum tree she used to dig gum out of; a look of concentration on her face as she watched the last dingy gray board of the house fall in toward the red-hot brick chimney. Why don’t you do a dance around the ashes? I’d wanted to ask her. She had hated the house that much” (167). This flashback that Mama shares with the reader provides insight to the personalities of her daughters. Mama tells the reader how Dee used to feel
Mama only has a second grade education,while Dee is a collage graduate. Dee never liked her home she says it's old and has bad memories because it looks to much like their old house that burnt to the ground. Dee doesn't respect her mama or little sister. When Dee comes home one time Mama instently knows somethings not going to end up the way they plan.
Once Mama realizes that Maggie had always stuck by her side she, “Hugged Maggie to [herself] , then dragged [Maggie] on into the room, snatched the quilts out of Miss Wangero’s hands and dumped them into Maggie’s lap” (Walker 616). Mama was acting on her epiphany, she knew that Maggie should be cared for and protected from her sister because she was loyal to her mother, it was the least she could do. She begins to realize that she was holding onto a daughter that did not embrace her family and so she let her go and embraced the daughter who was there for her all along. Mama’s change can also be demonstrated when she notices, “Maggie [smile]… a real smile, not scared… the two of [them] sat there just enjoying, until it was time to go in the house” (Walker 616).
Everyone has their opinions on a subject. In the short fictional story,”Everyday Use,” by Alice Walker, we see how different personalities equal these different thoughts. We see this in Maggie and Dee who have different opinions on their African American heritage. Dee and Maggie both grew up in a poor household. They have different views as they grew.
When you look at it from Dee’s point of few she just seems to be pushing her family to expand their education and have a better life. Dee doesn’t want her family on a farm and raising cattle because that isn’t what she likes. She has an open mind about things and sees them as more than just what they are used for, hence the title, “Everyday Use.” Dee may seem like a rude, spoiled girl, but looking at it from her perspective, all she wants is for her family to live the way she does. Changing the point of view from Mama to Dee would make a major difference.
(Pg.57, lines 210-211) It is considered one of the main conflicts because of how valuable the quilts are to Maggie and
Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo [Dee] is a fascinating character in “Everyday Use” written by Alice Walker. The story is over an African American mother and her two daughters. The story focuses on one daughter, Dee that is coming home to visit her family. She grew up wanting to become a different a person, and she hated how she lived when she was with her mom and sister. Dee is spoiled, tenacious, and ignorant in this short story.
As she looks at her quilts, Mama remembers that a certain patch came from her grandfather's paisley shirts, that some pieces came from dresses that Grandma Dee wore 50 years earlier, and even that there was a very small piece of her great-grandfather's Civil War uniform. From this, we can all see how and why they mean so much to her. To Dee, the quilts are a quaint "primitive" art. To Mama and Maggie, they represent more than that. They are family memories, very personal and very special mementos of loved ones who are gone.
Mama always dreamed that she will be in a show with her daughter Dee and Dee will be thanking mama of all what she’s done for her, but she knows it won’t happen. Maggie is smaller than Dee and she is always nerves and very shy, when she was a child their house got burned at that time she was very scared maybe that’s what makes her nerves and shy and that also hides her personality what she looks from the inside she hides it from the outside. Maggie lives at home with mama, she never spends time in the outer world she always stays at home and mama protects
Dee’s transformation is more external than it is internal. She shows her transformation in the way she speaks, the clothes she wears, and her judgement. Mama’s transformation is more internal. She begins to see Dee’s real thoughts, and she stands up against her. When she takes the quilts away from Dee, she doesn’t only stand up for herself, but Maggie, as
Alice Walker wrote what Mama said about Dee or Wangero, “Dee wanted nice things.” Mama describes Dee as a lavish person who is only interested in herself and her fulfilling’s. Dee had changed her name to show that she is not accepting that a “white person” named her ancestors in way, so it can be passed down. Walker describes Mama as someone who is satisfied with what they have. “I will wait for her in the yard that Maggie and I made so clean and wavy yesterday afternoon,” Walker demonstrates how Mama is pleased with nature where her life takes place in.
“the quilts are the central symbol of the story representing the connectedness of history and intergenerational tries of the family” (“everyday use”). This means that the quilts mean heritage and remind the daughters of grand mom dee. The quilts are fought over at the end of the story because of the meaning of them. One daughter wants them for everyday use and one wants them just to have them because it means heritage to her. The mother at the end of the story agrees that they should be used for everyday use.
Mama wanted nothing but the best for her; she did everything in her power to get her to college because she wanted her to have a better life than she did. However, Dee used her education against Mama and Maggie in efforts to present her culture in a “better” way. Changing her name to Wangero because her birth name “Dee”, as she informed them “I couldn’t bear it any longer, being named after the people oppress me” (Walker 27). In contrast, Mama and Maggie never changed the way they dressed “African descent” or change their names to portray their true
Alice Walker was a social activist, born in 1944. She is very popular for her novel “The Color Purple” that was published in 1982. Before that, she wrote “Everyday Use” in 1973. It is a short story about a family that branches out in their own way throughout the years. She shows us that the daughters were being directed into two different pathways.
The story is told from the point of view of their mother, Ms. Johnson, and it is from her that we learn about the difference in the sister’s characters. Dee, who changes her name to Wangero, is outspoken and is the educated sister. Maggie is shy and appears to be ashamed of the burns on her skin. “[Maggie] thinks her sister has held life always in the palm of one hand, that ‘no’ is a word the world would never learn to say to her” (Walker 6). This is important because, in the end, Dee does not get her way.
This womanist conceptualization is shown by a nuanced destruction by Dee’s response to the quilt, which is the main metaphor in the story. A typical political rhetoric is represented in the character of Dee. This is a rhetoric which is more aggressive than mature, showier than subtle. Dee ends up in simplifying and commodifying culture, instead of relating it to any meaningful way. She comes out as a being who takes activism as a fad rather than a commitment.