Irony In Everyday Use By Alice Walker

Alice Walker’s short story Everyday Use is as prolific as it is complex. Imbued with irony throughout, the short story explores various themes concurrent with social issues of the set time period such as racial tensions and gender identity. Yet, Walker’s greatest success in Everyday Use comes in the juxtaposition of heritage and identity, both in the form of internal and external exhibitions. Walker challenges what society has deemed acceptable in terms of how one identifies and connects to their heritage. The short story offers an unreliable narrative that consistently tugs the reader between both ends of the spectrum in terms of how heritage “should” be exercised. It is in this recognizable unreliability that Walker’s purpose is clearly showcased.

Maggie personifies repression, having suffered “burn scars down her arms and legs” from when their old house burned down (1531). These physical scars have left her with emotional scars, turning her into a closed-off figure, afraid of her outwardly successful sister, Dee. However, it is important to take into account that this is the way Mama perceives Maggie, and not necessarily the way Maggie feels about herself. Even more significantly, this is Walker exploring the Southern Grotesque, physically damaging Maggie in order to allow Mama to hold her daughters as opposites and perhaps even to justify her ultimate confrontation with Dee. Maggie’s entire persona—from the vantage point of her mother—ultimately stems from the seemingly inflicted damage of the fire. Dee, on the other hand, is “lighter…with nicer hair and a fuller figure” (1532). Dee is by far the story’s most interesting exploration of a stereotype; there is irony in that despite what her appearance may indicate about her heritage, she does not live within her heritage in the same manner as her family does, she merely showcases it on a grander scale. Dee has returned with a new outward look on her African heritage, embracing the name of Wangero and rejecting the name that came from “the people who oppress” her (1534). Her new manner of dressing is also a representation of this newfound African identity, along with the appearance of her Muslim partner, Hakim-a-barber. While it is easy to argue that Dee, or Wangero, has only embraced her heritage to the extent of her outward appearance—for instance having no interest in actually using the butter churner, only displaying bits and pieces that give the illusion of some connection to her ancestors—she represents another form of heritage and identity. Exemplified best by Joe Sarnowski in his literary critique, “Dee/Wangero understands the value of what the