Topic: Write an essay of no less than three pages in response to the following: The author manages to create a relationship between the characters' heritage and the things they use everyday; what strategies did she employ to achieve this end? Develop specifically using information from your experience as well as citations from the source (Everyday Use by Alice Walker).
In “Everyday Use”, Alice Walker the writer creates a relationship between the heritage of the characters and the things they use every day. Alice Walker uses symbolism, irony and personification among others, to build the plot of the story. According to Webster’s New World Dictionary (2002), Heritage is a property that is or can be inherited, or a tradition that is handed down from one’s ancestors. Everyday use as the name implies is anything that is used on a daily basis. The relationship between heritage and everyday use in the story is symbolized by the quilts; the dasher to make butter; the churn used to make sour milk or butter milk; the old benches Dee’s Father made and the name Dee. Mother and Maggi in the story are personified as the preservers of heritage and Dee brings in conflict in the form of Irony by implying she understands heritage and is in a better position to conserve it when in actual fact, she is confused as to the how to preserve heritage by the exposure of her unbalanced thoughts. In my personal experience my heritage and everyday use are intertwined. My name, African clothes, beads, my skills in cooking traditional African dishes, which I learnt from my mother are symbolic of who I am.
In “Everyday Use”, Walker relates personification to everyday use by attributing it to the preservation of heritage. Though Maggi is scarred and lucks confidence, she is going to marry John Thomas. She has a legacy to carry to her marriage which cannot be taken from her. A legacy she can preserve by teaching her children to quilt since she was thought to quilt by Grandma Dee and Big Dee. After dinner when Dee rifles through her Mother’s truck and picks two quilts insisting to keep them, Maggi is not worried. She says to her Mother, “She can have them, Mama I can ’member Grandma Dee without the quilts” (page 284). Though she is not intelligent, she has skills of value which cannot be taken away from her. Maggi and her Mother have always lived in the country side. Though their old house burnt down, they got a new one which looked exactly like the old, indicative of their conservative nature. Dee confirms this by saying to Maggi “it’s really a new day for us. But from the way you and Mama still live you’d never know it” indicating that Maggi and her Mother still live as country people, using valuable possessions as everyday use when they could live in the city and use these possessions as valuable decorations to depict their heritage.
Dee according to Walker is delighted about everything in her Mother’s house when she visits. She is thrilled that her Mother still uses the benches her Daddy made for the table when they could not afford chairs. She thinks they are lovely and runs her hands underneath them to feel the rump prints. Mother believes in preserving her heritage, indicative of the good soul food cooking, anticipating Dee’s return. Dee on her part enjoys her Mother’s cooking and eats everything her Mother prepared. It can be implied that Mother cooks well because she learnt how to cook from her Mother, a heritage which is everyday use. I learnt how to cook from my Mother who learnt how to cook from my Grandmother. In America, when my extended family or a family friend is hosting a party, I am asked to cook a traditional food called ‘Banku’ and Okro soup which am an expert in making.
Symbolism in the power of a name is used as a strategy to develop the story and plays a very significant role. The name Dee is a symbol of heritage which is everyday use because she is named after her aunt Dicie who was named after her Grandmother who was named after her Mother. The name Dee is a heritage of the family which her Mother traces from memory to four generations. Dee professes to be a preserver of heritage but willingly gives up her name and takes up a Moslem name, Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo. She is confused. How can she claim to be a firm believer in heritage when she throws away the only everyday use heritage anyone who meets her is bound to pronounce? My name is Cynthia Delali Noviewoo. I am from the Ewe tribe of Ghana, West Africa. My first name is Christian indicative of my baptism. My middle and last name traces me as far back as my village in Ghana. In Ghana, when I mention my name, out of the ten regions, the name connects me to only one region, the Volta Region because they are the only people who name their children that way. The Ewes according to history, escaped from Notsie located in Togo, West Africa because of a wicked King Agborkoli who was maltreating them. They escaped from tyrannical rule and relocated in Ghana and Benin and that is why Ewe is spoken in these three West African Countries and the reason why any of these three tribes anywhere in the world are able to identify my heritage by my name regardless of their educational status, based purely on the everyday use of my name. This is how powerful the heritage of a name is.
The use of irony brings conflict in Dee’s believe in heritage. She feels she is the only one in the family who is bent on preserving the family heritage because she is the only educated one in the family. She believes that being enlightened and living in the city with a dasher which she has no everyday use for and states “…and I’ll think of something artistic to do with the dasher.”(Page 283), and a churn top which she is going to use “as a centerpiece for the alcove table.” makes her a preserver of her heritage. She thinks that because these items were made by her ancestors the best way to preserve them is to use them as decorations and not as everyday use as they are intended for. Walker successfully uses Dee as an irony to contrast her believes and her actions. Another point worth noting that creates conflict and irony in Dee’s character is her change of name. She states that “… I couldn’t bear to be named after the people who oppress me.” Yet she wants to possess the heritage of those same people. She changes her name to a Moslem one and yet eats pork and collards which her Moslem boyfriend says are unclean; she is confused and not truly converted.
The relationship between heritage and everyday use is intertwined. Maggi and her Mother preserve their heritage by using it as everyday use and Dee claims to a strong advocate of her heritage by collecting items of everyday use as decoration for her room. When her Mother offers her the quilts before college she rejects them. In college, she is transformed by the teachings professes to be a firm believer in preserving her heritage. On her return home, she wants the quilts but her mother offers her alternative quilts from the ones she chose to keep. She rejects them because they are stitched around the borders by machine. She wants the quilts made out of clothes worn by her Grand Mother or Great Grand Mother 50 or more years ago. She wants to hang them for decoration and Maggi she claims will not appreciate the quilts because she will put them to everyday use. I preserve my heritage by using old utensils my parents used in their marital home. I wear the beads my Grandmother gave me and I teach my friends and nieces how to cook traditional meals and make local herbs like my Mother thought me. They are everyday use and to preserve my heritage i use them on a daily basis when the need arises.
Works Cited
“Ewe History.” http://www.bridgingdevelopment.org/ewehistory.htm. “Web.” Assessed
03/10/2010
“Heritage.” Webster New World Compact Desk Dictionary and Style Guide.
2nd ed. 2002. Print.
Lester, James, and Lester James Jr. Writing Research Papers: A Complete Guide.
New York Pearson: Pearson, 2010. Print.
Kennedy, X.J and Gioia Dana. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama and Writing Compact Edition, 6th ed. Boston, Longman, 2010. Print.
“Regions of Ghana.”http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/geography/region.php.
“Web.” Assessed 03/10/2010
In “Everyday Use”, Alice Walker the writer creates a relationship between the heritage of the characters and the things they use every day. Alice Walker uses symbolism, irony and personification among others, to build the plot of the story. According to Webster’s New World Dictionary (2002), Heritage is a property that is or can be inherited, or a tradition that is handed down from one’s ancestors. Everyday use as the name implies is anything that is used on a daily basis. The relationship between heritage and everyday use in the story is symbolized by the quilts; the dasher to make butter; the churn used to make sour milk or butter milk; the old benches Dee’s Father made and the name Dee. Mother and Maggi in the story are personified as the preservers of heritage and Dee brings in conflict in the form of Irony by implying she understands heritage and is in a better position to conserve it when in actual fact, she is confused as to the how to preserve heritage by the exposure of her unbalanced thoughts. In my personal experience my heritage and everyday use are intertwined. My name, African clothes, beads, my skills in cooking traditional African dishes, which I learnt from my mother are symbolic of who I am.
In “Everyday Use”, Walker relates personification to everyday use by attributing it to the preservation of heritage. Though Maggi is scarred and lucks confidence, she is going to marry John Thomas. She has a legacy to carry to her marriage which cannot be taken from her. A legacy she can preserve by teaching her children to quilt since she was thought to quilt by Grandma Dee and Big Dee. After dinner when Dee rifles through her Mother’s truck and picks two quilts insisting to keep them, Maggi is not worried. She says to her Mother, “She can have them, Mama I can ’member Grandma Dee without the quilts” (page 284). Though she is not intelligent, she has skills of value which cannot be taken away from her. Maggi and her Mother have always lived in the country side. Though their old house burnt down, they got a new one which looked exactly like the old, indicative of their conservative nature. Dee confirms this by saying to Maggi “it’s really a new day for us. But from the way you and Mama still live you’d never know it” indicating that Maggi and her Mother still live as country people, using valuable possessions as everyday use when they could live in the city and use these possessions as valuable decorations to depict their heritage.
Dee according to Walker is delighted about everything in her Mother’s house when she visits. She is thrilled that her Mother still uses the benches her Daddy made for the table when they could not afford chairs. She thinks they are lovely and runs her hands underneath them to feel the rump prints. Mother believes in preserving her heritage, indicative of the good soul food cooking, anticipating Dee’s return. Dee on her part enjoys her Mother’s cooking and eats everything her Mother prepared. It can be implied that Mother cooks well because she learnt how to cook from her Mother, a heritage which is everyday use. I learnt how to cook from my Mother who learnt how to cook from my Grandmother. In America, when my extended family or a family friend is hosting a party, I am asked to cook a traditional food called ‘Banku’ and Okro soup which am an expert in making.
Symbolism in the power of a name is used as a strategy to develop the story and plays a very significant role. The name Dee is a symbol of heritage which is everyday use because she is named after her aunt Dicie who was named after her Grandmother who was named after her Mother. The name Dee is a heritage of the family which her Mother traces from memory to four generations. Dee professes to be a preserver of heritage but willingly gives up her name and takes up a Moslem name, Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo. She is confused. How can she claim to be a firm believer in heritage when she throws away the only everyday use heritage anyone who meets her is bound to pronounce? My name is Cynthia Delali Noviewoo. I am from the Ewe tribe of Ghana, West Africa. My first name is Christian indicative of my baptism. My middle and last name traces me as far back as my village in Ghana. In Ghana, when I mention my name, out of the ten regions, the name connects me to only one region, the Volta Region because they are the only people who name their children that way. The Ewes according to history, escaped from Notsie located in Togo, West Africa because of a wicked King Agborkoli who was maltreating them. They escaped from tyrannical rule and relocated in Ghana and Benin and that is why Ewe is spoken in these three West African Countries and the reason why any of these three tribes anywhere in the world are able to identify my heritage by my name regardless of their educational status, based purely on the everyday use of my name. This is how powerful the heritage of a name is.
The use of irony brings conflict in Dee’s believe in heritage. She feels she is the only one in the family who is bent on preserving the family heritage because she is the only educated one in the family. She believes that being enlightened and living in the city with a dasher which she has no everyday use for and states “…and I’ll think of something artistic to do with the dasher.”(Page 283), and a churn top which she is going to use “as a centerpiece for the alcove table.” makes her a preserver of her heritage. She thinks that because these items were made by her ancestors the best way to preserve them is to use them as decorations and not as everyday use as they are intended for. Walker successfully uses Dee as an irony to contrast her believes and her actions. Another point worth noting that creates conflict and irony in Dee’s character is her change of name. She states that “… I couldn’t bear to be named after the people who oppress me.” Yet she wants to possess the heritage of those same people. She changes her name to a Moslem one and yet eats pork and collards which her Moslem boyfriend says are unclean; she is confused and not truly converted.
The relationship between heritage and everyday use is intertwined. Maggi and her Mother preserve their heritage by using it as everyday use and Dee claims to a strong advocate of her heritage by collecting items of everyday use as decoration for her room. When her Mother offers her the quilts before college she rejects them. In college, she is transformed by the teachings professes to be a firm believer in preserving her heritage. On her return home, she wants the quilts but her mother offers her alternative quilts from the ones she chose to keep. She rejects them because they are stitched around the borders by machine. She wants the quilts made out of clothes worn by her Grand Mother or Great Grand Mother 50 or more years ago. She wants to hang them for decoration and Maggi she claims will not appreciate the quilts because she will put them to everyday use. I preserve my heritage by using old utensils my parents used in their marital home. I wear the beads my Grandmother gave me and I teach my friends and nieces how to cook traditional meals and make local herbs like my Mother thought me. They are everyday use and to preserve my heritage i use them on a daily basis when the need arises.
Works Cited
“Ewe History.” http://www.bridgingdevelopment.org/ewehistory.htm. “Web.” Assessed
03/10/2010
“Heritage.” Webster New World Compact Desk Dictionary and Style Guide.
2nd ed. 2002. Print.
Lester, James, and Lester James Jr. Writing Research Papers: A Complete Guide.
New York Pearson: Pearson, 2010. Print.
Kennedy, X.J and Gioia Dana. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama and Writing Compact Edition, 6th ed. Boston, Longman, 2010. Print.
“Regions of Ghana.”http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/geography/region.php.
“Web.” Assessed 03/10/2010
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