Brandon Sanchez
Professor Chapman
ENC 1143
04 March 2016
Heritage in Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use”
Heritage remains one of the most vital factors that represents where a person originates from.
Alice Walker brilliantly tells a story through the character, Mama, and her first person point of view. She
also uses her two daughters Dee and Maggie. Throughout the story, Walker reveals an African-American
family living in a rural area struggling financially. The oldest daughter, Dee attends college in the city and
plans to return home after many years. Maggie remains at home with Mama and constantly shows her
insecurities about scars on her body from a house fire. Dee is ashamed of her family’s simple way of
living, and becomes greatly influenced by the time apart from them. In the short story by Alice Walker
“Everyday Use,” she insinuates the importance of fully embracing family heritage through Dee and
Maggie’s thought process and actions.
Walker enforces the idea of Dee steering away from embracing heritage by using keen
