Culture in Everyday Use Essay

The Anthology of the American Short Story has many American short fiction stories. When having to go through and choose one for my essay, I had a hard time because all the authors I wanted to read, we are already reading for class. So I studied a lot of different authors and finally found one that caught my eye. Alice Walker is best known for her critically acclaimed novel The Color Purple. This novel made her the first African-American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, as well as winning the National Book Award. I was excited to see a short story I could read by her to write about. When I found Everyday Use by Alice Walker, in the index I first read through the story and the first thing that came to mind was heritage. This short story focuss a lot about the different views you can identify even within a family. Walker illustrates the importance of understanding our present life in relation to the traditions of our own people and culture. Throughout the story Walker illustrates ones cultures and heritage represented by not only possession of objects, but by ones lifestyle and attitudes.

In Everyday Use Walker shows the different sides of culture and heritage through the characters she has placed in the story. There is a have a mother, the narrator, and her two daughters who we see throughout the story. Maggie is the daughter that lives at home with her mother, and you can tell right away that their views on culture and heritage are going to be basically the same as one anothers. They live a simple way of life and value their heritage and culture for more of the personal significance. Then we hear about the other daughter, Dee, who you can tell is complex and shows modern ways of life where culture is to be valued. It seems as if Dee has more of a materialistic connection as to how she sees her heritage.

Also Walker clearly identifies and shows the differences in her characters. Right away we see the narrator (the mother) explaining herself as a large big-boned woman with rough man working hands (791). This shows what she has inherited from other generations. She also describes her various abilities including, I can kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a manI can work outside all day, breaking ice to get water for washing. I can eat pork liver cooked over the open fire minutes after it comes steaming from the hog. One winter I knocked a bull calf straight in the brain between the eyes with a sledgehammer and had the meat hung up to chill by nightfall.(791) Clearly Walker shows that the mother has learned from her ancestors and that being tough is part of her heritage. On the other hand, Dees character in the story has relations to a number of people in society that do not know about their heritage. This is why Walker makes it seem that Dee herself has gotten lost in the societies views. It even seems as if Dee does not even care about her heritage, especially when it comes to the quilt made by her grandmother.

Walker shows that both Maggie and the mother are very proud of the quilt that they have from their ancestors. It represents so much of the past, and all Dee wants to do with it is hang it in with out even knowing the real meaning of the quilt. Scraps of dresses Grandma Dee had worn fifty years ago. Bits and pieces of Grandpa Jarrells paisley shirts. And one tiny faded blue piecethat was from Great Grandpa Ezras uniform he wore in the civil war (796). That is just a bit of the description of the quilt that Walker places in her writings. Maggie and the mother know the knowledge and history behind this quilt, which is were I believe the title of this story came from. The quilt put their ancestors memories to everyday use. Dee is blind to see these clues and it is obvious to whom the quilt should belong to. And that is in fact Maggie, not only because she knows the background, but she herself has helped make things that represent her ancestors.

Through Everyday Use Walker shows culture is not name changes, but ones cultures and heritage are simply taught from one generation to the next. These things can not just be picked up and learned in one day. From reading this short story it also made me appreciate my culture and heritage a little bit more. This in the end shows that Walkers writing can truly touch a person, just as it happened from The Color Purple. A person who knows real heritage and culture may actually make use of it every day of their lives.