Tradition in Everyday Use Essay

Everyday Use

In Everyday Use by Alice Walker, which takes place in the 1960s when tradition was very important; Mama was put into the position where she had to choose between which two daughters to give the family air loom quilts that had been passed down by her mother. When Dee pays an unexpected visit requesting the quilts, Mama decides to give them to Maggie because she will keep the family tradition.

Mama is a traditional southern black woman who lives in a very old shack-like house that has holes in the walls where the windows would be. She lives in the racist south and is intimidated and unaccustomed to white people and is cut off from the mainstream society. Like many black women of her time she was uneducated because her school was closed when she was in the second grade probably by the white racists. However, she has traditional skills, appropriate for survival in her surroundings, has profound knowledge of her family history which both were passed down by oral transmission. Maggie is also traditional; shes very shy and withdrawn because of the burns she received from her first house burning down. Shes also mentally slow and is intimidated by her older sister who is much prettier and much smarter than her. However, she too has traditional skills, she knows all the history of the handmade implements and most importantly she knows how to quilt. Shes most likely going to marry someone from the community and continue the tradition.

Unlike Maggie and Mama, Dee is much modernized. As a child Dee was very ambitious and anxious to escape her poverty-stricken environment. She was ashamed of her family and would never bring anyone to her home. She hated the house she lived in because it looked like a shack. The community and her family raised money so she can get an education. On the day the

story takes place, Dee arrives on a very infrequent visit. Mama is astonished because Dee is wearing African clothing and jewelry. Shes also taken an African name and the religion of her boyfriend which is Islam. In the 1960s African Americans in response to widespread racism, they embraced and began affirming their true roots. She was trying to establish here new proud African identity but also authentic southern rural roots. However, Dee is a hypocrite because she is taking pictures of a house she despises to show her authentic southern roots, but in reality shes confused about her identity.

The conflict of the story arises when Dee asks for the quilts that were promised to Maggie on her wedding day. The quilts represent tradition and heritage. They are made up of old clothes in a patchwork pattern that began being pieced together as far back as the civil war. Dee was offered the quilts before but she rejected them because she believed them to be old-fashioned. Dee believes Maggie wont show her appreciation by putting them to everyday use.

At the end of the story, Mama gives the quilts to Maggie. She realizes that Maggie has never really received anything in her life. Another reason is because Maggie knows how to quilt and when they became worn or used she can repair them and pass on the tradition. Dee would make them into an artifact therefore embalming the tradition and not passing it on to future generations.