Everyday Use By Alice Walker Analysis

764 Words2 Pages

Essay of “Everyday Use” In the story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker there are many significant themes that are used. Each theme used in the story is supported by great imagery as well. This story features conflict between the main characters Dee and Mama. The story shortly references each situation from the past and present. Throughout the story Mama and Dee have many conflicts with each other. Each conflict describes a situation that helps explain the relationship that Mama and Dee have with each other. The first conflict comes from a back story given to the readers between Dee and Mama. In the beginning of the story mama admits that she admires how Dee is always so outgoing, and in other words head strong. Mama also referenced examples, …show more content…

This is the most powerful because this is the point where Mama cannot take anymore of “Wangero”. In this section of the story Dee or “Wangero” is trying to find different possessions that her ancestors made to take back with her. Dee finds all kinds of different antiques that she would like to use to put in her home, and she also finds the quilts. The quilts that Dee wanted were made by Mama and Big Dee, which is Mama’s sister. These quilts were significant because they going to be for Maggie, which Dee’s sister. Maggie has received the short end of the stick over everything throughout her whole life, and mama had been saving those quilts for her special day. When Dee tried to do what she normally does, which is get her way, Mama had to finally put her foot down. Dee also tries to insult Maggie by saying “ … Probably be backwards enough to put them to everyday use.” (Walker 432 ). At this point Mama knew she had to finally stand up for Maggie, and she does. She takes the quilts away and gives them to Maggie, who has not said a word. This conflict was so significant because it shows how Mama has finally grown from the admiration that she has for

Everyday Use
623 Words | 2 Pages
...y're just collecting dust in the bottom of this old trunk." Momma had other quilts to use. She would not begrudge Dee. However, Momma did promise them to Maggie and so Momma had to keep that promise because Momma knew that regardless of how much more "successful and smart" one daughter was could not be allowed to diminish the love she had for Maggie. For Momma, a promise was a promise and barring her own death, it would be kept.
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Everyday Use by Alice Walker
1476 Words | 3 Pages
How does the difference between the way Dee (Wangero) and Maggie would use the quilts represent their two different ways of defining and treating their family’s heritage? Does the narrative give approval to Dee’s way or Maggie ’s?
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Imagery in "Everyday Use"
780 Words | 2 Pages
...made for, she no longer offers much imagery to the reader. The story comes to an end as the mother reminds Dee that she was once offered the quilts and refused them because she thought they were "old fashioned and out of style" (880). She also turns the table on Dee by snatching the quilts out of Dee's hands and dumping them into Maggie's lap. She tells Dee to get a couple of the other quilts, and with that said, Dee storms out.
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Literary Analysis Of Everyday Use By Alice Walker
850 Words | 2 Pages
Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” is a short story about an African American family that struggles to make it. Mama tries her best to give Maggie and Dee a better life than what she had. In Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use,” Dee is the older sister and Maggie is younger. Dee is described as selfish and self-centered. Maggie is generous, kind, and cares the family’s history together. She would go out of her way to make sure that her older sister, Dee has everything she needs and wants. Maggie is also willing to share what she has with her sister. Maggie is also shy and vulnerable. Mama is the mother of Maggie and Dee. Mama is fair and always keeps her promises to her children. Hakim-a-barber is the boyfriend
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Everyday Use
1546 Words | 4 Pages
Everyday Use ends with Dee leaving, not with the quilts, thus making room for the new bond between Mama and Maggie. Dee may believe that she has won in some way because she is the educated sister who appreciates her heritage, but the reader sees it is in fact Maggie who has become victorious by having her way of life validated by Mama’s support and Dee’s envy. Maggie’s system of values is redeemed by creating a new relationship, with herself, in which she is no longer silenced and can truly appreciate the beauty of her home even in its everyday use. While there is little growth seen from the experience on Dee’s side, we know that Maggie is forever changed, giving her more power than she ever had. There is still and will always be a struggle between her and her sister, but Maggie now knows she does not need redemption from Dee, nor anyone else, because it is she who carries the importance of the past into the future.
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The Importance Of Time And Place In Everyday Use By Alice Walker
875 Words | 2 Pages
Quilts symbolize a family’s heritage. Maggie adheres the tradition by learning how to quilt from her grandmother and by sewing her own quilts. Maggie also puts her grandmother’s quilts into everyday use. Therefore, when Dee covets the family’s heirloom, wanting to take her grandmother’s hand-stitched quilts away for decoration, Mama gives the quilts to Maggie. Mama believes that Maggie will continually engage with and build upon the family’s history by using the quilts daily rather than distance herself from
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Everyday Use, by Alice Walker and The Lottery, by Shirley Jackson
709 Words | 2 Pages
Symbols are displayed in both stories; the quilts in “Everyday Use” symbolize the memories of Mama’s family. The quilts are made of pieces of old clothing from Mama’s family. Each piece of the quilt represents that person and who they were. They are passed on to future generations along with stories of the ancestors’ past. The quilts represent pride of their ancestors’ struggles, where they came from and the fight to preserve their individuality. Unlike Dee, Mama and Maggie acknowledge their heritage from memories of their family members. Dee bases her heritage off ...
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The Character of Mama in Alice Walker’s Everyday Use
936 Words | 2 Pages
One situation in particular that Mama brings up is the time when she offers to Dee to bring some of the ancestral quilts with her to college. She claims, “I had offered Dee a quilt whe...
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Mama’s Character Traits in Purple Hibiscus, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
619 Words | 2 Pages
Mama is a very quiet character in the beginning of the story. The book starts off when papa throws a missal at Jaja for not attending the Communion. The missal papa throws causes Mama’s favorite figurines to fall and break. Mama quietly observes the scene and she cleans it up. Out of respect for Eugene, she has nothing to say even though the figurines were something she favors and cares about. Adichie writes, “She stared at the figurin...
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Character Analysis: Nothing Can Be Changed, By James Baldwin
966 Words | 2 Pages
This reveals that she takes pride in the manly roles as well as cultural roles that she plays even though her daughter Dee does not approve. Mama is proud of how she played both roles and even stated that she “deliberately turned her back on the house” (149). Mama also comes across as prideful when she does not give the quilts to Dee. The quilts that Dee wants are part of their family heritage. Mama explains, “In both of them were scraps of dresses Grandma Dee had worn fifty and more years ago.
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Family Heirlooms In Everyday Use By Alice Walker
1151 Words | 3 Pages
The quilts were pieced together by Mama, Grandma Dee, and Big Dee symbolizing a long line of relatives. The quilts made from scraps of dresses worn by Grandma Dee, Grandpa Jarrell’s Paisley shirts, and Great Grandpa Ezra’s Civil War uniform represented the family heritage and values, and had been promised to Mama to Maggie when she married. However, Dee does not understand the love put into the making of the quilts, neither does she understand the significance of the quilts as part of her family heritage. It is evident she does not understand the significance of the quilt, having been offered one when went away to college declaring them “as old-fashioned” and “out of style”. She does not care about the value of the quilts to her family, rather she sees it as a work of art, valuable as an African heritage but not as a family heirloom. She wants the quilts because they are handmade, not stitched with around the borders. She tells Mama, “Maggie can’t appreciate these quilts!... She’d probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use… But, they’re priceless!.. Maggie would put them on her the bed and in five years they’d be in rags. Less than that!” (317). The quilt signifies the family pride and history, which is important to Mama. She makes the decision to give the quilt to Maggie who will appreciate it more than Dee, to whom she says, “God knows I been saving ‘em for long enough with
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Point of View in Alice Walker's Everyday Use
1143 Words | 3 Pages
exactly what's going on and begins to resent Wangero even more. The quilts themselves are symbols in the story, interpreted in different ways, by the narrator, the author, the reader, and Wangero. Again, Walker uses the narrator's simplicity to her advantage. While Wangero sees the quilts as a symbol of her heritage, the narrator. sees them only literally, as blankets to be used, not saved for. cultural posterity.
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Literary Analysis: "Everyday Use"
692 Words | 2 Pages
Mama is hoping that Maggie will use the quilt as a practical everyday item. She sees the quilts for their functional use that they were made to use in everyday life. Meanwhile, Dee finds this absurd. She thinks they are too valuable and priceless to be using as everyday necessities. Instead she will hang them. These two ideas of how to use the quilts are in complete contrast of one another. Mama finds them practical, Dee finds them fashiona...
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Analysis of Everyday Use by Alice Walker
628 Words | 2 Pages
The story 'Everyday Use', written by Alice Walker, is a story of heritage, pride, and learning what kind of person you really are. In the exposition, the story opens with background information about Dee and Maggie's life, which is being told by Mama. The reader learns that Dee was the type of child that had received everything that she wanted, while Maggie was the complete opposite. The crisis, which occurs later in the story, happens when Dee all of a sudden comes home a different person than she was when she left. During the Climax, Mama realizes that she has often neglected her other child, Maggie, by always giving Dee what she wants. Therefore, in the resolution, Mama defends Maggie by telling Dee that she cannot have the household items that she wants just to show others, instead of putting them to use like Maggie.
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The Importance of Personal Identity in Alice Walker's Everyday Use
623 Words | 2 Pages
Author Alice Walker, displays the importance of personal identity and the significance of one’s heritage. These subjects are being addressed through the characterization of each character. In the story “Everyday Use”, the mother shows how their daughters are in completely two different worlds. One of her daughter, Maggie, is shy and jealous of her sister Dee and thought her sister had it easy with her life. She is the type that would stay around with her mother and be excluded from the outside world. Dee on the other hand, grew to be more outgoing and exposed to the real, modern world. The story shows how the two girls from different views of life co-exist and have a relationship with each other in the family. Maggie had always felt that Mama, her mother, showed more love and care to Dee over her. It is until the end of the story where we find out Mama cares more about Maggie through the quilt her mother gave to her. Showing that even though Dee is successful and have a more modern life, Maggie herself is just as successful in her own way through her love for her traditions and old w...
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Everyday Use By Alice Walker Analysis

Everyday Use