Kristina Presbitero
Professor Bush
English Composition II
September 13, 2012
Young Adulthood: The Fitting Room for Identities Just as we use a fitting room to try clothing on before we purchase it, young adulthood can be seen as a fitting room for the many identities that we are familiar with, along with the ones we are still discovering. As we grow older, we try to fit ourselves into one particular group that seems familiar to us. While reading “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, we see Dee’s world revolving around this premise. The article “Stylish vs Sacred in ‘Everyday Use’” written by Houston Baker provides great evidence for this idea. Dee’s arrival home brings an unwelcome surprise as they notice she has altered her physical appearance, and attitude alike. This leads to her betrayal of family values. Dee’s arrival home makes a strong impression on her family. Walker writes, “A dress down to the ground, in this hot weather. A dress so loud it hurts my eyes. There are yellows and oranges enough to throw back the light of the sun” (Walker 365). This gives the impression that Dee wants to stand out above all others. Along with the flashy dress, she pairs huge bangles and hoop earrings, as if the outfit needed an extra pop of color. This dress may have made sense if not for its impracticality. Even though Dee finds the dress hot and cumbersome, she still wears it to sport her newfound identity for her family. She accomplishes her goal of standing out when compared to her family. In the story the narrator states, “In real life, I am a large, big-boned woman with rough man-working hands. In the winter I wear flannel nightgowns to bed and overalls during the day” (Walker 364). Comparing these two women is like comparing insects to elephants. Of course, that is exactly what Dee is hoping for. Once she had left, that was her cue to try and become her own person. She just was not so sure about whom to “become”. It becomes apparent that she has chosen her new life when she re-introduces herself. “Not ‘Dee,’ Wangero Leewankia Kemanjo!” (Walker 366). She seemed to think that this new name suited her “heritage”, which it did very well. However, so had her previous name. Those who had “oppressed” her, even though this is what she assumes, had not given the name to her. She almost uses this as an excuse to change her name to something that may probably be changed once again within her lifetime. She will find a new name that she may like better or may suit her new persona. For her current identity she has chosen to take up the language of Swahili. Her greeting to her family is enthusiastic yet broken; therefore we can assume she is still new to the language or did not even attempt to learn the pronunciation. This is another sign of “testing out” her new identity. It becomes apparent that she is merely sampling the lifestyle instead of embracing it head on during the family dinner when the narrator states, “We sat down to eat and right away he said he didn’t eat collards and pork was unclean. Wangero, though, went on through the chitlins and corn bread, the greens and everything else” (Walker 367). Dee has no problem eating the food that she loves even though she knows she is not supposed to. She is only picking and choosing the pieces of each lifestyle that she prefers. This may work for her, but to someone that shares the same values as Hakim-a-barber, that could seem a bit insulting. They have given up things that they like in order to stay true to what they believe. Whether Dee actually shares their values or not is questionable. As Dee doles out her new heritage throughout the story, we reach the main conflict: the quilt. “Dee’s anger at her mother is occasioned principally by the mother’s insistence that paid dues make Maggie a more likely bearer of sacredness, tradition, and true value than the ‘brighter’ sister,” Baker writes (Baker 376). The sacredness, tradition and true value mentioned all refer to this special quilt. Why, you may ask, is Dee so interested in obtaining this quilt? It may be because she cherishes all of the hard work that her grandmother put into making this quilt. Then again, there is also the factor of fashionable artwork that must be hung for all to gaze at in awe. From what we know about her so far, the latter option is a safe bet. The sentimentality of these quilts to her sister, Maggie, plays an important role because it is Maggie that is “willing” to give them to her sister during the debate. The selfless act is the crucial point that eliminates any doubt that the narrator had of letting those quilts go. If Dee had thought more about her sister’s feelings and less about herself, she may have been able to walk out with them. The narrator states, “I didn’t want to bring up how I had offered Dee (Wangero) a quilt when she went away to college. Then she had told me they were old-fashioned, out of style” (Walker 368). They may have been out of style, but that was not the reason the narrator wanted to give them to her in the first place. She wanted Dee to have something sentimental with her when she went away. All Dee could think about was “What is fashionable nowadays?” Now that these quilts are fashionable, she will do anything to have them. Once she obtains them and hangs them up, all they will ever be from then on are decorations. Dee looks down upon any other function for them. When speaking about Maggie and the quilts, she states, “She’d probably be backwards enough to put them to everyday use” (Walker 368). Everyone has their own opinion on how to use personal items, but that is what those quilts were made for. Their grandmother did not stitch her old dresses and other relatives clothing together to be displayed. It was a heartfelt gesture that was meant to be passed down, rags or not. This story brings up issues that everyone goes through at one point in their life or another. We all battle with identity issues and think that we know what we want. While we are in that fitting room we try on things we like, things we don’t like, and things that other people might like on us. We fight with our families. We go back and forth between this and that. Everyone is perceived differently, but only you know who you really are.

Works Cited
Baker, Houston A. ““Stylish vs. Sacred in ‘Everyday Use’.” Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Eds. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 7th Ed. New York: Longman, New York, 2010. 375-377. Print.

Walker, Alice. “Everyday Use.” Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Eds. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 7th Ed. New York: Longman, New York, 2010. 363-369. Print.