In the short story, "Everyday Use", the author Alice Walker makes use of daily objects, that are are portrayed in the story with particular detail, and the response of the key characters to these objects, to contrast the simple and practical with the stylish and faddish. The main individuals in this story, Dee and Maggie on one side and Mama on the other. Each have contrasting views on the worth and rate of a variety of points in their existence. The author makes use of this clash to make the point that the matter of an item, and that of individuals, is more important than the manner in which it is done.
The key protagonists in this tale turn out to be differing in a high level. Mama, the speaker of the tale, portrays herself as a "huge, woman with big bones and has rough, man-working hands" (paragraph 5). She does not paint an appealing picture about herself, although she keeps on stating the many matters she can handle. Just like the things in the location she is positioned, she turns out as having more awareness in realism, and has few interests in the artistic view of the matter. Dee, on her part, turns out to be defined by her intellect of design, and does not turn out to be doing something. During the moment when her name was Dee, she developed hatred for the things surrounding her for because the lack of style and beauty that she greatly upholds. The moments she became part of the nation of Islam and she decides to change her name to Wangero, because she recognized these old objects as a part of her tradition and vocations of knack.
There was no moment though when she ever decide to make real use of the particular objects. Some examples of such objects are the dasher and churn of butter. The dasher and churn of butter are both elaborated in finer features by Mama, which shows how much they appreciate her. The churn of butter that had been shaped by Buddy, Dee’s uncle was one thing that Dee needed to take back with her eagerly, even though she in particular wanted to make use of the top of the churn as a "centerpiece for the alcove table" (paragraph 53). The underneath of the other half, supposedly, would be misused. Dee would also "think of something artistic that had something to do with the dasher" (paragraph 53). Dee never appears to have thought that she is carrying off her mother's churn of butter, an important object, for an inconsequential advantage.
The items that direct to the final argument that erupts between Mama and Dee are the old comforters. These comforters are illustrated as being made from old items by family members thereby ending up enhancing their worth to Mama, and the feature through which they are portrayed raises the sense of the plot of the story. Dee sees the comforters as having past and traditional values because of employing the use of hands for stitching and raw materials used in the process. Mama had assured the comforters to Maggie, and Maggie's response to the information that Dee needed them portrays that Maggie has a poignant attachment to them in addition.
"Maggie cannot appreciate these quilts!" Dee says. "She'd probably be backward enough to put them to use it every day." (paragraph 66). Based on the fact that Dee barely wants to hang them up on a wall to be viewed at, describes the line of reasoning the author is trying to come up with.
The objects within the book can therefore be used to relate to the people who easily identify their worth to them based on the level at which they are used to portray the importance of the work. The individuals on their part may end up changing their views having interacted with their colleagues on the value of a particular quilt they choose to use. An individual may choose to use it differently as well so long as it meets their needs as expressed within the story.
The objects in this story, portrayed with the loving detail done by Mama, are also used to further improve the background of the story about the importance of the objects use on every single day to the different kinds of individuals that were described in the story. Just as these objects are illustrated, they come in handy to the person who reads it, and the reader can easily identify with the main importance of the objects to both Dee and Mama relayed within the novel. The author makes good use of the everyday objects to be the sign of focus of the tale on the appealing and value of readily understood objects and common individuals, over that which is abstentious, fashionable, and fundamentally of no use to the people within the setting of the book.
Work Cited
Walker, Alice. "Everyday Use". An Introduction to Literature, 11th ed. Ed. Barnet, Sylvan, et al. 409-415.
