Since the beginning of the 18th and 19th centuries, women have worked to share their experiences in dealing with the repressive patriarchal society and their efforts to destroy the most ugly stories about women in writing. One of the most urgent and passionate voices of emerging female authors was an African-American woman. Survivors focused on […]
Tag Archives: Alice Walker
What I would like to discuss here is the meaning of poetry in the lives of women. Women often write poems about writing poems. (I have not found many poems of this sort by men.) Amy Lowell writes “…we’re a queer lot We women who write poetry… I wonder what makes us do it, Singles […]
Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use” reminds me a lot of my family. No, I am not African-American, and I did not grow up in the rural South, but the characters of Mama, Dee, and Maggie remind me of my mom, me, and my sister. The three of us look alike, share some DNA, and […]
This is not meant to disrespect Mo’Nique for her Academy-Award winning performance in the movie, or for even the book for which the movie was based (also winning an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay). No, my reasons for not watching the movie have to do with the subject matter. As a society we should be […]
In Alice Walker‘s “Everyday Use”, the three main characters are necessary in revealing the underlying concepts of the story. The critic Timothy Sexton asserts that the older daughter, Dee, is the “embodiment of the struggle for a unifying identity” (par. 4). In contrast with Dee, the critics Houston A Baker, Jr. and Charlotte Pierce-Baker consider […]
For a story written in first person, Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” brings point of view to new heights. The way the story is written let readers in on more than just one perception. The story is centered on an African-American family in the south set back in the 60’s. A mother tells her story about […]