Joanne Joseph
　
　
          Alice Walker's Everyday Use helps me to understand the definitive role of culture, discovering personal values, family traditions and heritage. This story also made me recall situations in my life and others, where people have to find an apical balance between embracing their own identity and/or becoming consumed by someone else's artistic, musical, culinary and other social elements that they would so imitate. In other words, everyone is raised within a culture; a set of customs and morals handed down by generations before them.
In today's society, many are unaware of their heritage because of what is portrayed by the media that may forcefully define themselves. Society also loses sight of their roots and favors an alternate identity from another class or socioeconomic group.
This story is narrated by a mother with two daughters. The narrator describes herself as a “large, big boned woman with rough man-working hands.” She goes into further detail of her strong character by describing some of her routine attributes. “In the winter I wear flannel nightgowns to bed and overalls during the day… I can kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a man.” The description of her character shows a hard-working woman who is enraptured with her lifestyle and a wealth of cultural traditions and tough roots.
     Walker describes the differences in her daughters, for there is a clear distinction as the story unravels. The sisters Dee “Wangero” and Maggie, share the same background and were raised in the same household, however they think and act distinctly different. Furthermore, their clashing characteristics serve as symbols to convey the overall theme of the story. Dee's name change to “Wangero Leewankia Kemajo” was the first thing that struck me. Dee explained to her mother that she couldn't bear it any longer being named after people that oppressed her. I believe that Dee has alienated herself and wasn't too fond of the idea of her name being traced back to the times of slavery, or even being named after her aunt and grandmother.
The narrator of the story thought that perhaps she would have a profound appreciation and acknowledge the legacy of her name. Dee is ashamed of where she came from and feels like her family's manner of living is not up to par or substandard to hers. That is evidently shown in the passage; “burned us with a lot of knowledge we didn't necessarily need to know and she will never bring in her friends to see where her mom lives'. These negative connotations in this story show that Dee is ashamed of where she came from. Maggie, on the other hand, is the stay-at-home daughter who tends to be timid, naïve and insecure. She feels inferior and “thinks her sister has held life always in the palm of one hand, that 'no' is a word the world never learned to say to her”. Higher education has hindered the relationship between Dee and her family.
     The narrator is sort of in the middle of this awkward and conflicting relationship with her beloved two daughters. Dee wants an old quilt her ancestors made because she was impressed by the generational art work but the narrator promised to give it to Maggie when she gets married. She believes that her so called less fortunate daughter doesn’t deserve it and won’t show any appreciation for having it in her possession. She had to decide between one or the other; One who would display the quilts and household items as pieces to be viewed and admired as a way of the old life, or to the other daughter who would use them in the way they were meant to be used, to continue the family tradition by quilting and using them every day . This story centers on Maggie even if she had a low self esteem and was insecure, she surely grasped her heritage.