What is Alice Walker’s purpose in writing everyday use?

But Walker’s main purpose in the story seems to be to challenge the Black Power movement, and black people in general, to acknowledge and respect their American heritage. The history of Africans in America is filled with stories of pain, injustice, and humiliation.

In her short story “Everyday Use,” Alice Walker takes up what is a recurrent theme in her work: the representation of the harmony as well as the conflicts and struggles within African-American culture. “Everyday Use” focuses on an encounter between members of the rural Johnson family.

The theme is that family members can lose track of each other’s needs and desires. Dee cares nothing for the family’s daily needs, and so does not see the value of the quilt in terms of its “everyday use.” Sometimes a person, like the mother in this story, has to step out of character to set things right again.

A walker is a type of mobility aid used to help people who are still able to walk (e.g., don’t require a wheelchair) yet need assistance. It is a four-legged frame that allows a person to lean on it for balance, support, and rest.

Quilts. … The quilts are pieces of living history, documents in fabric that chronicle the lives of the various generations and the trials, such as war and poverty, that they faced. The quilts serve as a testament to a family’s history of pride and struggle.

Walker conveys her message through the voice of a flexible, observant first- person narrator. It is the mother’s point of view which allows the reader to understand both Dee’s and Maggie’s characters and positions. The mother’s narrating perspective provides objectivity from which she can overlook all situations.

Why does Dee want the quilts? Dee wants the quilts so she can hang them up in her home and remember her heritage. … At the end of the story, the mother “snatched the quilts out of Mrs. Wangero’s hands and dumped them into Maggie’s lap” (8).

Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” highlights the importance of cultural heritage and family history through strong uses of symbolism. … Dee is a symbol of success, accompanied by her lack of remembrance and care for her ancestral history. Maggie, her sister, is a symbol of respect and passion for the past.

The story is centered around the conflict of Dee wanting special items from Mama’s house only to put them on display and never use them.

Cowart argues Walker purposely portrays herself as Wangero, while actually intending a self-depiction of Maggie. This may be due to the “distorting pressures” brought on to African Americans and the different shapes Walker’s writing has taken due to that distortion.

In the short story, “Everyday Use”, by Alice Walker, why does the narrator want Maggie to have the quilts instead of Dee? … Maggie helped her grandmother make the quilts, but Dee refused to learn how to make them.

The tone of the story is very apprehensive and agitated. This reflects Mama’s deep conflicted views about welcoming her daughter, Dee, home yet rejecting Dees condescending attitude towards both Mama and Maggie.

“Everyday Use” The story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker is a story between a mother and her two daughters. The story is mainly about a mother and one of her daughters Dee. The conflict is how they both see the world differently.

The story follows the difference between Mrs. Johnson and her shy younger daughter Maggie, who both still adhere to traditional black culture in the rural South, and her educated, successful daughter Dee—or “Wangero” as she prefers to be called—who takes a different route to reclaiming her cultural identity.

It’s kind of a no-brainer to conclude that the quilts in “Everyday Use” symbolize family heritage. They were handmade by the narrator, her sister, and her mother, and they’re comprised of clothing worn by generations of family members.

When Mama gives the quilts the Maggie, she ensures that the family heritage will stay alive in the manner she prefers. By using the quilts and making her own when they wear out, Maggie will add to the family’s legacy, rather than distancing herself from it.

What motivates the narrator to give Maggie the quilts? … “It was Grandma Dee and Big Dee who taught her [Maggie] how to quilt herself. She stood there with her scarred hands hidden in the folds of her skirt. She looked at her sister with something like fear but she wasn’t mad at her.“

The mood in “Everyday Use” is contemplative, moving from uncertain to strong as the story progresses.

• The House. Mama and Maggie’s house works in “Everyday Use” to represent both the comfort of their family heritage and the trauma built into that history. …
• Quilts. …
• Eye contact / Vision / Gaze.

The significance of the title “Everyday Use” and the effect of the story’s portrayal of a daughter’s brief visit hinge on the irony that comes from the sisters’ differing intended use for the quilts. … Mama contends that Maggie, supposedly mentally inferior to her sister, has an ability that Dee does not: she can quilt.