Everyday Use By Alice Walker: An Analysis

It is often the variant of a child’s up-bringing that determines their placement and

views within society, the setting of time and place are a key factor in this as well. In

“Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, Dee, a teenage, Afroamerican girl who was born and

raised in a rural country town in the southern U.S. during the 1960’s was the product of

a single mother, and through the help of the church Dee was able to go to school.

Demographically and geographically, Ann Copeland’s character, Honey, from “The Bear’s

Paw” opposes Dee in that she was a caucasian girl raised in Connecticut amidst the

1980’s. Both raised on the forefront of the, by present day standards, pre-modern era

have been dealt a primary consumer society where traditional and modern

(transition sentence) . Honey does she same thing in her goal to get the

best deal on one of Minnie’s handmade quilts. Honey and Minnie’s attitudes conflict in

how they value things which causes Honey to return home empty handed. Minnie’s

business “was a matter of heart... nothing could induce her to part with one of these

treasures unless she saw it would be valued. And it had little to do with dollars and

cents.... You could [also] insult her if you offered too little.” (18). Honey, unknowingly,

overlooks Minnie’s way of business and insults her on almost every account from

requesting that she have an original design, even though her style was developed from

her mother’s and her grandmother’s teaching. Honey then shows a lack of respect for

Minnie’s work by claiming that if need be, she could always buy an incomplete piece and

have her “seamstress back in Rowayton... quilt it for [her]” (20). Through Honey’s easily

permeable exterior, Minnie could see that her quilt would not receive a home that