Understanding
Understanding Heritage: A Character Analysis from "Everyday Use" In the short story "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker, a misunderstanding about a family's heritage occurs. The family consists of Mama, Maggie, and Dee. Mama is one of the main characters and she also narrates the story. She is described to be a, "large big-boned woman with rough, man working hand"(Walker 61). From this you can picture a very strong willed woman, who has work her entire life to have what she has. Maggie, the youngest daughter, is a quite shy girl. She became this way after a house fire that burned her severely. She is described as having her, "chin on chest, eyes on ground, feet in shuffle"(62). Dee, on the other hand, is very different from her mother and sister. A closer look at Dee reveals why. As a child Dee acted as though she was better than anyone in her family. She was impatient, ungrateful, and was ashamed of her family because of their social status. When the family's first house burned down, a
She eyes a butter dish that was whittled by her uncle. When Mama tells Dee, she says, "Maggie can't appreciate these quilts!" She'd probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use. She doesn't understand that her family's heritage should come before her culture. nd Maggie was so badly scared on the outside and in, there was some suspicion that she started the fire because she hated the house so much. She confuses heritage with culture. The quilts are composed of old pieces of dresses worn by her grandmother, and there was even a piece of her Great Grandpa Ezera's Civil War uniform stitch on one of them. Mama had offered them to her before, but she didn't want them. No one accused her, but the suspicion was there. After she arrived and introduced Asalamalakim, "a short stocky fellow with hair to his navel" as the story describes him, Mama calls Dee by her name and she says, "Not Dee, Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo!" Dee changed her name because she "couldn't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppressed me"(64). She begins taking pictures of her family and their house, but she never gets in them. Now, Mama had promised the quilts to Maggie. When Mama saw Maggie standing in the doorway looking sad she snatches the quilts from Dee and gives them to Maggie. There are some quilts, Dee also eyes that were hand made by her mother and Aunt Dicie. While Dee is visiting, she begins rummaging through everything looking for things to take back with her. She asks for it and Mama gives it to her, but she says, "I can use the churn top as a center piece for the alcove table"(65).
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