Heritage In Alice Walker's Everyday Use

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In Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use”, Mama and Maggie are anticipating the arrival of Dee, since she has not come home to visit in quite some time. As they wait in the yard, Dee and her boyfriend, Hakim-a-barber, finally arrive and come to eat dinner. Dee asks Mama if she can take back some of the family heirlooms with her to decorate her house with, but does not realize that the things she wants are still being used in everyday use by her family. As the story progresses, it is present that Mama tried her very best to give Dee a higher education, but Dee tries to forget about her family past, yet she thinks her heritage is for show, and her disposition has completely changed since she moved away and received an education.
In 1927, when Mama was growing up, her school closed, and she only had a second-grade education. Of course, “colored’ people did not ask many questions back then since racism was a prevalent thing. She wanted the best for Dee so she and the church helped her attend college in Augusta because she wanted her to become someone important in life. Getting an education was hard to obtain during their time period, and they would try to allow at least one …show more content…
Dee believes that she is only able to remember memories by the physical things, while Maggie and Mama picked up on the ways that their past generations had taught them. So, Maggie and Mama did not need the physical things to remember. Dee’s ways have changed, and the way she looks at her family as if they are on display at a museum. Her getting an education made her think she was better than her sister, intellectually and physically, as she told Maggie, “You out to try to make something of yourself, too, Maggie. It’s really a new day for us. But from the way you and Mama still live you’d never know it” (321). In the end, Dee drives away without the quilts and Maggie and Mama go back to their “everyday”
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