By Alice Walker

best-known for her novel The Color Purple, which was published in 1982 and won both the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award the following year

The novel was adapted into a movie that was nominated for an Academy Award in 1985, produced by Quincy Jones and directed by Stephen Spielberg.

an amazingly productive and versatile writer.

published five novels, four collections of poetry, two collections of short stories, three books of essays, and many articles and stories for magazines

edited a book about one of her mentors, the writer Langston Hughes, served as a contributing editor for Ms. Magazine

has taught at several colleges and universities.

Have you ever read a story in which you can see yourself in one of the characters? If yes, what story was it? What did you have in common with the character?

Each person shares his/her response.

No comments and interruptions until everyone has shared.

Based on the title, Everyday Use, what do you think the story is about?

Each person shares his/her response.

No comments and interruptions until everyone has shared.

You’ll find three characters dominate “Everyday Use”

A woman and her two adult daughters: Mama, Maggie, and Dee

In one interview about this story, Walker said she thinks of the characters as herself, split into three related parts.

recompose

Regain calmness and control

Asking questions

PredictingVisualizingMaking connections

Summarizing

Reflecting and relating

EvaluatingRevising meaningForming interpretations

clarifying

Draw a plot diagram for the story. How would you divide the plot and explain

your reasons. What is the conflict and climax of the story?

Write a 2-Chunk paragraph per character.

What kind of person is Maggie? What kind of person is Dee? What kind of person is the mother?

1. List the characteristics of the three main characters in “Everyday Use” as they are revealed by the narrator. How do the differences between these two characters add to the conflict in the story. What IS the conflict?

2. What is the point of view in “Everyday Use”? How does the style of writing reflect the character of the person who tells the story? That is, look at the language of the speaker. What are characteristics of that language and how do those characteristics reflect the personality of the speaker?

3. What do the quilts symbolize? What other evidence in the story lead us to see the quilts as symbols of a bigger issue? How does the climactic ending turn the tables on Dee’s use of terms like “backward” and “heritage”? What is ironic about Dee’s use of these words?

4. How does the title hint at the central theme of the story? What other evidence in the story hints at the central theme? What is that central theme? What in the story helps especially to bring the theme to life for you and keep it from becoming an abstract idea?

5. What IRONY occurs when the departing Dee accuses her  mother and  sister of not understanding "your heritage" (845, par.  82)?  Significantly who smiles at this point, and why does she smile?  

6. Who is the ANTAGONIST of the story?  Explain.

7. In the end, with which characters does Alice Walker seem to side on the issue of heritage?