“Everyday Use” written by Alice Walker, is a short story which is told from the perspective of Mrs. Johnson who is also known as Mama. This story is about two daughters who are of African American descent but value their culture in very different ways. In Walker’s “Everyday Use”, Maggie and Dee share little to no similarities and demonstrate a number of glaring differences.
As two sisters have different priorities, they also have different perspectives on the family. Dee slightly pushes her family away from her while Maggie stays close and values her family. Dee is the oldest daughter, who is naturally beautiful. She cares more about fashion and what the modern world has to offer. She is very outgoing, assertive and smart. Throughout the story, Dee “is so shiny and bright” (Alice 00:17:20-00:17:25). Her mother never tells her no which leads to her believing that she gets everything even if she doesn’t deserve it. Dee leaves her family to go to college and to live in a more modern and stylish world than her family; “Earrings gold, too, and hanging down to her shoulders” (Walker 745). While on the other hand, Maggie is younger and very practical. She happens to be more shy and timid than her sister, “She will stand hopeless… ashamed of the burn scars down her arms” (Walker 743). She has little to no education compared to her sister and ever since the fire she is very self-cautious of her body as she is physically and mentally scarred. Though Maggie “will be nervous until after her sister goes” (Walker 743). She stays close with her mother but does not stay as close to her sister because she realizes that her sister gets what she wants and it will always be that way.
Although both of the daughters come from the same family, they both have very different lives. Maggie and her mother live in a more southern home, where they live a less modern life than Dee “No doubt when Dee sees…she will never bring her friends” (Walker 745). They may live in houses that they can fall through, but Mama and Maggie are comfortable with how they live. Mama and Maggie both went through a very harsh house fire, and Maggie happened to become badly injured. Dee was mainly embarrassed of her family. She watched her childhood home burn down which “She hates the whole thing… something in her spirit that is offended by this ugliness” (Alice 00:08:17-00:08:31). Dee however, watched the home burn down rather than show any type of concern towards her family. Her mother raised enough money, which allowed Dee to go off to college and leave her family behind. Once Dee went off to college, she gained access to a good education while her mother and sister had no type of education. She lives a materialistic life where she “now finds her scorned past to be fashionable” (Kane 2138). She now is more concerned with how she looks rather than the meaning behind the object.
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Apart from the obvious difference between the two girls’ lives, both Dee and Maggie not only show their differences physically they show them mentally too. In this short story, both sisters are African American, and their culture plays a big role in their family. Maggie embraces her African American culture, while her sister Dee does not exactly accept her culture as much. An instance such as “changing their names, and changing their hair …this was very disrespectful …to their ancestors” (“Alice Walker”). Dee decided that she wanted to move away and change her name completely, but this would be looked at as insolent. This wouldn’t just be disrespectful towards her ancestors, but also towards her mother. Changing her name would “lead to a great deal of hurt on… being dismissed and denied” (Alice 00:02:05:00 – 00:02:20:00). Dee automatically believed that she would get to keep the quilts made by her grandmother for herself because “Dee claims two quilts handmade…earmarked for Maggie on her marriage” (Kane 2138).
These quilts are special to both sisters, but for different reasons. The quilts are composed of garments worn by different ancestors throughout their family lineage “Quilting to represent…maternal ancestors” (Tate 4). Dee, however, has no true appreciation for her heritage and never has. She also has never had any respect or understanding of why her mother’s belongings are so important to her lineage. She just sees them as decoration or something that has value to her family, but she does not see exactly why. On the other hand, Maggie has never really lost sight of why her family’s heritage is so important. She realizes that she doesn’t need to have quilts to remember who her family so she almost allowed Dee to take them “She can have them, Mama” (Walker 748). She understands the struggles that her family went through to be proud of whom they have become. She completely understands that these quilts represent her family and her culture. Maggie shows that she has love towards her heritage, while Dee is just obsessed with the idea of having a connection with her heritage.
Throughout the story, some specific events help to show what each daughter has gone through to completely show how their experiences through their childhood made them who they are. Maggie and Dee both come from the same background, but they both have very different perspectives on how much their culture truly means to them. These peculiar sisters have different mindsets, lifestyles, and respect towards their families. This short story shows that both of these sisters take their heritage seriously in their own ways. Maggie and Mama hold their culture deep in their own memories to never forget whom they came from and what their ancestors have gone through. While for Dee culture is used as a display rather than something she holds close to her within the mind. These two sisters show how something as little as their lifestyles to something as big as their culture can truly represent them as who they are.
Works Cited
“Alice Walker: A Stitch in Time.” Films Media Group, 2003, digital.films.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=-1&xtid=32667. Accessed 23 July 2019.Kane, Patricia. “The Prodigal Daughter in Alice Walker’s ‘Everyday Use’” Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama, edited by Robert DiYanni, 6th ed., McGraw Hill, 2007, pp. 2137-2138.
Tate, Claudia C., vol. 30, no. 2, 1996, pp. 308–309. , www.jstor.org/stable/3042377.Walker, Alice. “Everyday Use.” Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama, edited by
