Everyday Use By Alice Walker

“Everyday Use” by Alice Walker is a story about a family, with two sisters and a mother, and about the appreciation of their heritage. One of the sisters, Dee, treats objects from their culture as something that can only be appreciated by viewing and displaying, instead of appreciating it by using it every day. The older sister, Dee, leaves to go to school and when she arrives home, she is wearing African attire, she has changed her name, and she seems curious at all of the regular everyday items that her mother and sister use at home. Although Dee was making an effort to appreciate her culture and heritage, she was not going about it in the best way possible. This story “represents a severe conflict within America’s black society, where new radical views and misperceptions of the word heritage collide with traditional black rural life style.” (Lewis 1)

Dee’s appreciation of her culture is seeing the decorative value of what would be daily household objects for her mother and sister. Dee believes that these objects are some sort of abstract art, while for her sister and mother, they are simply everyday objects. “Despite her neo-African style, she has adapted to a white Western attitude towards art by applying the aesthetic concept of art for art’s sake to objects of everyday use.” (Lewis 1) Dee believes that the only correct way to appreciate their African American heritage is by treating these everyday objects as art, but those objects get their value from their everyday