...Characterization and Symbolism in "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker In Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" the theme of different ideas of heritage shared between Mama, and her two daughters, Dee and Maggie, is proven by her use of imagery, characterization, and symbolism. Walker uses symbolism and characterization throughout the short "Everyday Use" to show differences within her family and heritage. Mama is the narrator of the story and the mother of Dee and Maggie. In the beginning of the story, the reader learns Mama raised the girls alone thus making her a tough, strong woman: "In real life I am a large big boned woman with rough, man working hands (Walker.) Mama is uneducated and has worked hard throughout her life: "I can kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a man" (Walker). Mama is proud of herself and heritage and wants Maggie and Dee to be the same. Maggie is described as being unsocial, shy and unattractive. She has been severely burned which caused physical and mental problems. Mama has sheltered her from the outside world, "Severely burned in a house fire when she was a child, her scarred, ugly appearance hides her sympathetic, generous nature. She lives at home and is...
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...The Symbolism of Quilts Designs used in quilts are not necessarily symmetrically organized; rather the art of quilting reflects an aesthetic understanding by the makers of what the quilt represents for them in their everyday experience. (Barkley-Brown, 1990). The shape of a quilt results from the meaning that the individual quilters give to the pieces that compose it. This art form is known as gumbo ya ya in Creole which means everybody talking at once. (Barkley-Brown, 1990). Alice Walker’s usage of quilts in her short story Everyday Use reflects the importance and significance of a quilt in African-American history. A quilt embodies heritage and personal stories and events; a quilt is similar to a person’s own journey in that each scrap stitched into a quilt represents “a person’s world view [which] is made up of events, circumstances and influences that shape how [she] see[s] and respond[s] to the world.” (Eshbaugh, 2008, August 21). Narrated by the mother of the two main characters, the symbolism of the hand-stitched quilts in Everyday Use represents the conflicts between two sisters who each experience the world and their heritage differently. The story begins with Dee, the eldest daughter, first homecoming since leaving for college. Walker describes Dee as a woman who no one ever told “no.” Dee is well-educated, wears bright colors that accentuates her full-figured body and exudes confidence. However, Dee will never be satisfied in life, and she...
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...Mixed opinions, education and family dynamics are what Everyday Use is about. Dee is a young girl who is trying to reconnect with her “heritage” but in the attempt to do so she is ignoring her real heritage. She grew up to have opportunities for education that her mother and sister didn’t have. Dee’s opportunities were even described as, “She has held life always in the palm of one hand, that ‘no’ is a word the world never learned to say to her” (1334). There are several images and symbols in the book that portray different things to Dee and to Maggie. The biggest example of symbolism in this story is the quilts. The quilts to the two girls mean different things. For Maggie, the quilts are symbolic of the everyday use and the potential that...
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...Additionally, develop three possible topics for your paper, which your instructor will review for approval. Lastly, list and describe three to five sources that you will use to write your essay. |Literature |Title: Everyday Uses | |Selection One |Author: Alice Walker | | |Why I Chose This Piece: I chose this because of the symbolism it uses on the values placed on old quilts. | |Literature |Title: The House on Mango Street | |Selection Two |Author: Sandra Cisneros | | |Why I Chose This Piece: It emphasizes the symbolization on the emotions that Esperanza feels about her life circumstances. | |Topics |Primary Topic: Find the different symbolism and compare them between the quilts and the house. | | |Alternative Topic 1: ...
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...Meredith Butler English 1102 Fiction Essay In the story Everyday Use by Alice Walker, the author attempts to show the contrasts between family members in regards to their heritage during the 1960’s. Ms. Walker tells the story of how different the family members are in education, lifestyle and beliefs. In doing so, she illustrates the importance of everyday items and of everyday people. Ms. Walker, through the point of view of the mother, paints the picture of a young woman, too good for her family, running off to the city only to find that the city values her heritage and conversely, now must she. The character of Dee is first described by her mother in the excerpt, “Dee is lighter than Maggie, with nicer hair and a fuller figure” (Walker, 1973). This is in contrast to her “large, manly mother who can kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a man” (Walker) and her sister who was disfigured in a fire as a young child. The same fire that Dee stands and watches, so intently, that her mother thought to ask her “why she didn’t do a dance around the ashes” (Walker). It is never stated why Dee feels such deep hatred for her home, however shame and ignorance play a key role. “Dee wanted nice things” (Walker), things that would be difficult if not impossible to a young black girl of the time to obtain. Her mother often notes that Dee daydreams to the point of not blinking, determined to get what she wants. When Dee’s mother and the town raise money to send Dee off to school...
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...Hannah Huie Kate Evans Composition II 05 February 2015 Analysis of Characters in “Everyday Use” Alice Walker’s short story, “Everyday Use,” illustrates the importance of family and heritage. Many times in the story, Ms. Walker brings up heritage and the importance of recognizing of what it means to belong to something or someone. Her characters each go through change. Mama seems to switch her favoritism from Dee to Maggie and realizes that Dee is not the perfect child she had come to idolize her as being. Dee comes back home to realize that she no longer able to get her way as she used too and that her place in the household has changed. Lastly, Maggie is recognized as having the gift of knowing her heritage and having the ability to add to it by being able to quilt. As we read through the story we see that Ms. Walker paints a wonderful picture of difference between Dee and the family she left behind. Mama is the voice behind this short story. She narrates and you only see the story through her point of view. As she waits for her daughter Dee to arrive she has a fantasy about her life being on a TV show. She dreams of being a beautiful women, whose hair glistens in the spotlight of the stage, whose witty tongue has the famous TV personality Johnny Carson trying to keep up. As the reader continues they would be able to see that Mama’s true view of herself is not as flattering, she doesn’t mince the truth, and doesn’t have any false illusions about her looks...
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...“The black crow stares at me with death in his eyes,” would be a good example of symbolism. Symbolism is the use of symbols, like the crow, to represent ideas, like death. Crows are seen as a sign of death to some. Symbolism is used in everyday life, from literature to even when we talk. The story “Once Upon a Time” written by Nadine gordimer had good use of symbolism. In the story, a wealthy family lived in a very poor and angered place. They were worried about the safety of their little boy so they decided to have a wall put up to protect themselves. In the end though, the wall didn’t protect them. An excerpt from the book, ”He dragged a ladder to the wall, the shining coiled tunnel was just wide enough for his little body to creep in, and with the first fixing of its razor teeth in his knees and hands and head he screamed and struggled deeper into its tangles……Then the man and his wife burst wildly into the garden…….the alarms screamed while the bleeding mass of the little boy was hacked out of the security coil with...
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...In her short story “Everyday Use,” Alice Walker depicts opposing ideas about one's heritage. Through the eyes of two daughters, Dee and Maggie, who have chosen to live their lives in a very contrasting manner. Walker utilizes symbolism to highlight the dispute between two different points of view of, or approaches to, the African-American culture, showing that culture and heritage are parts of daily life. Through the use of symbolism, there are three of which I will refer to, one being the quilts, the tangible objects of the family heirloom, the yard, which she emphasis on and its physical characteristics, and then there’s the name changing, when Dee changed her name to a traditional African name, Wangero. The quilts were the most compelling symbol in the story. They signified pieces of living history, documents in fabric that chronicle the lives of the many generations and the struggles, such as war and poverty, which they faced. The quilts served as a testament to the family’s history of pride and trials. With the drawbacks that poverty and lack of education placed on her life, Mama sees her personal history as one of her few treasures. Her house embraces the handicrafts of her extended family. Instead of acquiring a financial inheritance from her ancestors, Mama has been given the quilts. For her, these objects have a sentimental value that Dee, despite claiming her desire to care for and preserve the quilts, is unable to fathom. Mama’s yard represents a private space free...
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...Courtney Osmond Professor Jhingree ENC 1102 12 March 2014 Symbolism in Eveline and Everyday Use Symbolism is a common part of any story; from a play to a poem. In both Eveline and Everyday Use, hidden symbols are used that represent each character. In Eveline, the symbol used is dust which covers everything in Eveline’s life. In Everyday Use, the quilt is the symbol that represents heritage. Also, additional symbols are used to define each character. Symbols add a hidden meaning to the story that can add depth to the characters. In James Joyce’s short story, a prominent symbol is dust. Eveline’s character has lots of dust, since she is lifeless, and never advancing. In Eveline, Eveline looks around her room taking everything in. She observes “all its familiar objects which she had dusted once a week for so many years, wondering where on earth all the dust came from (McMahan et al. 3).” This means that she is looking at her life and all the dust that has accumulated over the years. She is noticing how stale and boring her life is due to all the pressures of her dad. Her dad is the main cause of dust build up all these years. Her father abuses her and “says what he would do to her only for her dead mother’s sake (McMahan et al. 4).” The “dust” in Eveline’s life is due to the pressure of taking care of her dad, and trying to support him. Over the years the dust kept piling up, making the dust unmanageable, causing her to freak out at the end of the story. Just as she is about...
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...Poetry Essay COURSE # and TITLE ENGL 102: Literature and Composition SEMESTER OF ENROLLMENT Spring B 2011 WRITING STYLE USED Turabian Thesis “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost is a lyrical poem in which the emotion, symbolism, and certain rhythmic patterns are used to emphasize the thematics of the poem and the message the speaker is trying to deliver by writing it. Outline I. Introduction a. “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost II. Theme a. Literal: i.e. “fork in the road” as an actual path b. Symbolic: i.e. “fork in the road” as a contemplated decision III. Mood of the speaker a. Uncertain at the opening b. Satisfied with the conclusion in the statement, “and that has made all the difference” IV. Symbolism a. Christian perspective b. Choice between good and evil V. Rhythmic patterns a. Assonance b. Alliteration c. Consonance VI. Conclusion Poetry Essay In order to acceptably examine a poem, the reader must be able to interpret the representation and significances in what the poet has written it. Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” is a lyrical poem in which the emotion, symbolism, and certain rhythmic patterns are used to accentuate the thematic of the poem. It also helps to interpret the message the author or presenter is trying to send by writing it. Poems often times will have an actual, literal meaning as well as an unseen, symbolic, fundamental meaning that the speaker is trying to express to the reader. For example, in this poem...
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...Symbolism The period of romanticism is the period after the Enlightenment era and it deals with many concepts and such as symbolism, individualism, myths and emotion. The literature of this period was not just concentrated on the theory of romantics with the thought of love being the center of romanticism even though some of the works may be about love and affection, plenty of works like those assigned deal with different types of romanticism. Williams Wordsworth shows romanticism with his different uses of symbols in his writings and the same can be seen with works done by Leo Tolstoy. The lines that are taken out of the Tintern Abbey, he speaks about the light and darkness and describes them in certain ways. The “joyless daylight” (Wordsworth, 436) represents the truth and the light helps an individual see the truth. Sometimes the truth may not be what the individual wants to see and the darkness that he mentions represents hiding the truth from people and whoever the individual may be making them feel better. The symbolism he uses shows a grim type of romanticism that the period brings into sight. The next piece of literature would be the works from Leo Tolstoy. Like William Wordsworth, it shows a grim type of symbolism in the piece of The Death of Ivan Ilyich. The story gives symbolism that can be analyzed with the five stages of death developed by Elisabeth Kubler Ross. The different stages can be seen throughout the story showing symbols of him going through the...
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...even more difficult to comprehend without an aid of some sort but the short story The Veldt is different. The automated home the Hadley family live in does all of their everyday chores for them. In The Veldt, Ray Bradbury utilizes descriptive language and symbolism to express the experiences of living in the Happylife home. The language used creates vivid, lifelike images in the reader's mind that immerses them into an unrealistic world. Some other readers who analyze this story feel imagery is applied to the story and plays along with descriptive language. Symbolism is a heavy topic in this tale. Important parts stick out through symbols, which help the reader to relate to what is happening. Significant, impactful descriptive language and symbolism are placed in The Veldt. Descriptive language modifies how The Veldt can be perceived. When the short tale mentions how the main room, the nursery, shifts, “... presently an African veldt appeared, in three dimensions… the ceiling above them became a deeper sky with a hot yellow sun.” The veldtland description is so deep, that it plants whoever...
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...After reading The Other Side, one might understand the tone, symbolism, and audience the book reveals. The author uses symbolism to describe segregation on the little girls’ point of view. Many may also be able to find the tone to be curious and friendly. The audience is who the author is writing for. This story is for children, “’My name’s Annie,’ she said. ‘Annie Paul. I live over yonder,’ she said. ‘by where you see the laundry. That’s my blouse hanging on the line.’ She smiled then. She had a pretty smile.” This shows that there were two children who met for the first time. The other Side is from a little girl’s point of view; therefore, children are most likely going to read it. Tone, the emotion the author uses to get...
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...Traditions are sacred things that should be passed down from generation to generation but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t question them. Jackson uses symbolism, of the black box, characters’ names, and the title of the story itself to develop the theme of everyday violence and ignorance of tradition. One way Jackson uses symbolism is through the mystery of the black box because of its color and age. The black box was not just a regular box it was beaten up with all kinds of wood splitting from the box and the color “was no longer completely black, but splintered badly on one side” (Jackson 391). This just doesn't represent a drawing box, it was religious...
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...APA Thesis Statement / Outline Shirley Jackson’s ‘The Lottery’ and D.H. Lawrence‘s ‘The Rocking Horse Winner’ use personification, characterization, and symbolism, to develop the different themes contained in their short stories. I. Introduction a. A brief summary of the “The Lottery”, by Shirley Jackson b. A brief summary of the “The Rocking Horse Winner”, by D.H. Lawrence II. Overview of the use of, Personification, Characterization and Symbolism a. “The Rocking Horse Winner”, by D.H. Lawrence i. The personification employed in ‘The Rocking Horse Winner’ has a profound effect on the readers 1. The whispering house is the focus of the theme and plot i. Characterization of Paul and his obsession to gain his Mother’s love and fulfill her wish for more money that eventually leads to his death 1. The money hungry character traits that is passed down from Mother to child 2. Paul’s obsession has sexual overtones between him and his Mother i. Symbolism in developing the plot in “The Rocking-Horse Winner’ 1. The Mother’s insatiable need for wealth symbolizes superiority 2. Materialism replaces Love a. “The Lottery”, by Shirley Jackson i. Personification is omitted from this story ii. The Characters in “The Lottery” is developed through description 1. Every day people conducting life...
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