Essays on Everyday Use

When I’ve grown into a responsible adult, I’ve always found myself wondering: how much control do I have over the world and my surroundings? In today’s multicultural culture, plenty of us find ourselves conforming to our guardians’ earthly perspectives: looking no deeper than they do, even if we do think…

Walker’s characters stand out in the novel Everyday Use, in part because of her wits in struggling for her family’s heritage. The story takes place in the late 1960s, after a period of dramatic change for African Americans. African Americans gained their freedom from resistance, overcoming acts of segregation, brutality,…

The 1944 short story “Everyday Use” unfolds by showing the neatly made yard that Maggie and her mother have to do. The garden was made for Dee, who is Maggie’s niece, for a special visit. Although Maggie is anxious about the visit of a long-gone sibling, it is clear that…