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Critiques of "everyday use" by Alice Walker
Alice walker everyday use analysis essay
Alice walker everyday use analysis essay
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Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” An interesting thing about Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” is the fact that it seems to be told from the Mama’s eyes, rather than from one of the, arguably, main characters. This only allows the reader to see Mama’s bias in the entire situation. Because of this bias between her children, the reader can see the stark contrast of the two sisters. Alice tries to portray the importance of embracing heritage and the vulgarity of disregarding the purpose of things for one’s own pleasure. Maggie is introduced as someone who was shy and walked like “a lame animal” sidling up to someone who “was ignorant enough to be kind” (156). This is partly because of her self-consciousness of the scar scattering her arms and legs. Dee, by comparison, is the picture of confidence. She walks and speaks as if the world owes her everything she ever asks for. She feels powerful for getting away from what she saw as a prison. While Maggie is humble and kind, Dee will not hesitate to demand things and is ruthless in her pursuit. At least, Dee is ruthless in her pursuits, in Mama’...
In the story "Everyday Use" the narrator is telling a story about her life and two daughters, who are named Dee and Maggie. The narrator is very strong willed, honest, compassionate and very concerned with the lives of her two daughters. Her daughter Dee is not content with her lifestyle and makes it hard on Maggie and the narrator. The narrator is trying to provide for her family the best way she can. The narrator is alone in raising the two daughters and later sends her daughter Dee to college. The longer the story goes on the more the narrator shows how intelligent and how much she loves her two daughters.
Velasquez, Juan R. “Characterization and Symbolism in Alice Walker’s ‘Everyday Use’.” Lonestar. N.p.,n.d.Web. 17 Mar 2014.
Alice Walker is a well-known African- American writer known for published fiction, poetry, and biography. She received a number of awards for many of her publications. One of Walker's best short stories titled "Everyday Use," tells the story of a mother and her two daughters' conflicting ideas about their heritage. The mother narrates the story of the visit by her daughter, Dee. She is an educated woman who now lives in the city, visiting from college. She starts a conflict with the other daughter, Maggie over the possession of the heirloom quilts. Maggie still lives the lifestyle of her ancestors; she deserves the right of the quilts. This story explores heritage by using symbolism of the daughters' actions, family items, and tradition.
The characters in “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker serve as a comparison between how family heritage and traditions are viewed. Walker illustrates that heritage is represented not by the possession of items or how they look, but buy how they are used, how one’s attitude is, and how they go about a daily lifestyle. Every memory or tradition in “Everyday Use” strengthens the separation in the relationship between Dee and her mother, the narrator, which involves different views on their family heritage.
In "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker, Walker shows differences in human character, just by the way they act towards family members. The main character in the story, Mother, has two daughters that she treats very differently, and they treat her differently. One daughter looks down on Mother in a condescending manner, and the other is obedient and kind. In "Everyday Use", Walker shows that in relationships between a mother and daughters, adaptation to change can sometimes be very hard, which leads to pride and protecting what one has accomplished, and finally shows how un-appreciation can hinder these relationships.
In the short story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, the author portrays opposing ideas about one’s heritage. Through the eyes of two daughters, Dee and Maggie, who have chosen to live their lives in very different manners, the reader can choose which character to identify most with by judging what is really important in one’s life. In Dee’s case, she goes out to make all that can of herself while leaving her past behind, in comparison to Maggie, who stays back with her roots and makes the most out of the surroundings that she has been placed in. Through the use of symbolism, the tangible object of a family heirloom quilt brings out these issues relating to heritage to Mama, and she is able to reasonably decide which of her daughters has a real appreciation for the quilt, and can pass it on to her. Dee and Maggie shed a new light on the actual meaning of heritage through their personality traits, lifestyle decisions, and relationships with specific family members.
Walker's use of language when describing Maggie creates a picture of a physically scarred and unintelligent woman. Maggie's physical scarring is pointed out to the reader early in the story to lay a foundation for sympathy. Walker accomplishes this when she states that Maggie has, "burn scars down her arms and legs" (383). The matter of fact choice of vocabulary by Walker creates an image of a deformed person that would not be aesthetically pleasing by any stretch of the word. Walker fortifies her effort to create a sympathetic Maggie with her vocabulary when Mama states, "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" (384). The words "arms sticking" and "hair smoking" generates a grisly image in the reader's mind of a grotesquely injured little girl that is quite worthy of sympathy (Walker 384). It is not only the physical scars that were left by the fire that create sympathy about Maggie's physical appearance. Dee is described...
Velazquez, Juan R. "Characterization and Symbolism in Alice Walker's 'Everyday Use.'" Lone Star College System. Lone Star, n.d. Web. 3 Apr. 2014. .
The author?s decision to narrate the story from a first-person point of view allows the reader to gain insight into the mother?s struggle that wouldn?t have been available otherwise. Throughout the beginning of the story, the mother describes both her views of herself and of her daughters. She sees Dee as being superior to both she and Maggie. Dee always gets what she wants, whether it be through her family...
In Alice Walker’s short story, “Everyday Use”, the narrator is the mother who is uneducated, but loving and hard working. Dee and Maggie are her daughters, whom she cares for deeply. Maggie, the youngest daughter, shares many outlooks on life the way her mother does. She has never been away from home and she and Mama are very close. She learned valuable traditions and their history from her family members. In contrast to Maggie, Dee is in college and couldn’t wait to leave home. She always had ambition and goals that she had set high. Mama’s relationship with Dee is not close, but she dreams of their bond rekindling. As she waits for Dee’s arrival, she thinks about TV shows where the “mother and child embrace” and then the “child tell how she would not have made it without her help” (Walker 155). Walker states, “I dream a dream in which Dee and I are suddenly brought together on a TV program of this sort” (155). Because of Mama and Maggie’s practical attitude, they have a very hard time understanding Dee. Since she was exposed to the world outside of their rural, southern town, she feels liberated through the knowledge she has acquired. While Maggie and Mama see the butter turner, the quilts, and the benches as common house items, Dee see them as “priceless” works of art. Dee feels she is more connected with African American heritage but, Maggie exemplifies what culture really is.
Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday use” tells the story of a mother and her daughter’s conflicting ideas about their identities and heritage. Mrs. Johnson an uneducated woman narrates the story of the day one daughter, Dee, visits from college. Mrs. Johnson auto-describes herself as a “big-boned woman with rough, man-working hands.”(180,Walker). Contrasting her auto-description, she describes Dee as a young lady with light complexion, nice hair and full figure that “wanted nice things.”(181,Walker). The arrival of Dee to Mrs. Johnson’s house causes mixed emotions on Mrs. Johnson. Dee Johnson and Mrs. Johnson have differing viewpoints on heritage and each value possessions for different reasons. Dee’s superficiality and materialist ways clash with Mrs. Johnson’s appreciation and understanding of her heritage. The conflict between the two characters depict the meaning of the work which is that heritage is to be valued for both its usefulness as well as its personal significance.
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...
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
Unlike Dee, Maggie is shy and lacks confidence because of her burns. The mother states that she was “ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs.” However, Maggie does seem to have a sense of family. Dee, on the other hand, starting from her attitude towards her sister and mother, they are negative. It seems that for Dee her family and home were an embarrassment. The mother states that Dee “used to read to us without pity; forcing words, lies, other folks’ habits, whole lives upon us two, sitting trapped and ignorant underneath her voice.” Showing how not only she felt embarrassed of her family but, she also wanted to feel
There is nothing like a huge gap in families, they show how cultures and people have changed over time. The characters of the story Mama, Dee and Maggie are widely different. The author of “Everyday Use” Alice Walker shows this. The differences and the 3 different personalities in each character are shown.