Alice Walker
A Critical Analysis of “Everyday Use”Alice Walker is a well-known woman author. Several of her stories show us the life and oppression of the Afro-American woman. “Everyday Use” is a tale of a daughter’s return to the family and culture she has previously left behind. Walker combines plot, characters, and humorous fictional story to relate to the reader. The story begins with the mother sitting on the front porch, enjoying the clean yard, which Maggie and she have prepared for the arrival of Dee. The narrator then goes into a lengthy description of the characters. When her daughter, Dee, comes home with her black Muslim boyfriend, calling herself “Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo,” and tells her mother that she wants a quilted piece made by her grandmother because only she understand . . .
Dee has left her culture and become educated, but at the same time, lost her roots. The characters play a chief role in the short story. On the other hand, Maggie has stayed home and has confined herself to everyday offices. The theme of the story is given through the mother. In addition, the other characters, Maggie and Dee play a crucial part in this short story. “Don’t ask me why,” she declares, “in 1927 colored asked fewer questions than they do now. ” She wants to take the quilt and frame it. s its tradition, the mother is forced to become a judge over the matter. Although they are sisters, and both raised as poor Southern blacks, these two women seem to come from different worlds. To Dee, her roots are now represented as “art. She is sympathetic to the other daughter, Maggie who has stayed home and has been promised the quilt for her wedding. She describes how she was and she uses that to determine her decision of whether or not she should give the quilt to Maggie or Dee. This story gives us an insight that no matter what an individual’s past may be he or she can still make a change in order to give appropriate justice. She is a large woman who has always done a man’s work, and whose education stopped at the second grade. ” Though she sometimes fantasizes being on the Johnny Carson show, she laughs at her fantasies because she knows her true sense of worth.
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