Flashcards for Everyday Use

Big Dee

Big Dee is a minor yet symbolically important character in Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use."

character

Dee (Wangero)

Dee, who renames herself Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo, is the older daughter of Mama Johnson and the story's main antagonist in Alice Walker's "Everyday Use."

character

Grandma Dee

Grandma Dee is a deceased ancestral figure in Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973).

character

Hakim-a-barber

Hakim-a-barber is Dee's (Wangero's) companion—likely her boyfriend, though the narrator keeps their relationship intentionally ambiguous—in Alice Walker's "Everyday Use."

character

John Thomas

John Thomas is a minor but significant character in Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use."

character

Maggie Johnson

Maggie Johnson is the younger daughter of Mama in Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973).

character

Mama (Mrs. Johnson)

Mama (Mrs. Johnson) serves as the first-person narrator and moral center of Alice Walker's "Everyday Use."

character

“She can have them, Mama, she said, like somebody used to never winning anything, or having anything reserved for her.”

This line is from Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use (1973), narrated by Mama (Mrs. Johnson).

Mama (Mrs. Johnson, narrator)

“Dee is lighter than Maggie, with nicer hair and a fuller figure.”

This line comes from Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973), narrated by Mama (Mrs. Johnson), the mother of two daughters, Dee and Maggie.

Mama (Mrs. Johnson)

“I never had an education myself. After second grade the school was closed down.”

This line is spoken by Mama (the narrator, Mrs. Johnson) in Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973).

Mama (Mrs. Johnson, the narrator)

“She put on some sunglasses that hid everything above the tip of her nose and her chin.”

This line comes from Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973), narrated by Mama (Mrs. Johnson) as she describes her daughter Dee's return home.

Narrator (Mama / Mrs. Johnson) · Everyday Use (single-story, no chapters)

“I will wait for her in the yard that Maggie and I made so clean and wavy yesterday afternoon.”

This opening line is delivered by Mama (Mrs. Johnson), the first-person narrator of Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973).

Mama (Mrs. Johnson) · Opening paragraph

“I looked at her hard. She had filled her bottom lip with checkerberry snuff and it gave her face a kind of dopey, hangdog look.”

This line is from Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973), narrated by Mama, the unnamed mother of the Johnson family.

Mama (the narrator)

“Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs.”

This line is from Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973), narrated by Mama (Mrs. Johnson) as she waits in the yard for her daughter Dee to visit.

Mama (Mrs. Johnson, the narrator) · Opening / Part 1

“You just don't understand, she said, your heritage.”

This line is spoken by Dee, who now calls herself "Wangero," to her mother, the narrator, in Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use (1973).

Dee (Wangero)

“She used to read to us without pity; forcing words, lies, other folks' habits, whole lives upon us two, sitting trapped and ignorant underneath her voice.”

This line is spoken by Mama (Mrs. Johnson), the first-person narrator of Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use (1973), as she reflects on her daughter Dee's childhood habit of reading aloud to the family.

Mama (Mrs. Johnson)

“Maggie smiled; maybe at the sunglasses. But a real smile, not scared.”

This line comes near the conclusion of Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use" (1973), narrated by Mama (Mrs. Johnson).

Narrator (Mama / Mrs. Johnson) · Ending

“She's dead, Dee said. I couldn't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me.”

This line is spoken by Dee, who now goes by "Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo," in Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use (1973).

Dee (Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo)

Dee's Name Change

In Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use, Dee's choice to rename herself "Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo" highlights the conflict between real cultural heritage and a performative identity.

The Churn Dasher and Butter Dish

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," the churn dasher and butter dish symbolize the practical, living aspect of African American heritage—items valued for their use and the hands that crafted them, rather than for decorative purposes.

The House and Yard

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," the house and yard symbolize real, lived heritage — the kind that's worn and inhabited instead of just showcased.

The Quilts

In Alice Walker's short story Everyday Use, the quilts reflect the vibrant, practical essence of Black cultural heritage.

Foil

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," Dee and Maggie serve as contrasting characters whose differing relationships to heritage reveal the story's main argument.

Flashback

In Alice Walker's short story "Everyday Use," flashbacks play a subtle yet crucial role in shaping the reader's understanding of family dynamics before Dee makes her entrance.

Juxtaposition

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," juxtaposition drives the story, functioning on multiple levels at once.

Tone

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," tone serves as the story's most effective tool for judgment.

Symbolism

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," the quilts stand out as the story's main symbol, encapsulating the whole discussion about heritage in one physical object.

Irony

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," the irony is most striking in the clash between Dee's professed pride in her heritage and her real disconnection from it.

Unreliable Narrator

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," Mama, the first-person narrator, describes herself as a plain, big-boned farm woman who speaks with surprising honesty.

Imagery

In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," the imagery subtly conveys the story's main argument, allowing readers to feel it rather than just understand it.

pasture

A fenced field of grass where livestock graze; here it refers to the open yard around the family's home, described as an extended outdoor living space that the narrator keeps clean and tidy.

noun · Chapter 1

chitlins

The small intestines of a pig, cleaned and cooked as a traditional Southern soul-food dish; a marker of the family's rural, working-class Black heritage.

noun · Chapter 1

lye

A strongly alkaline solution made from wood ash and water, historically used to make soap or to cure certain foods; here associated with the family's hand-made domestic traditions.

noun · Chapter 1

dasher

The wooden stick with a paddle at the end that is plunged up and down inside a butter churn to turn cream into butter; a specific piece of old-fashioned kitchen equipment central to the story's debate about heritage.

noun · Chapter 1

churn

A container, traditionally made of wood or ceramic, in which cream is agitated with a dasher to make butter; in this story it is a handmade family heirloom.

noun · Chapter 1

benches

Simple, handmade wooden seats without backs, crafted by a family member because they could not afford store-bought chairs; used here as symbols of practical, lived heritage.

noun · Chapter 1

quilts

Bed coverings stitched together from scraps of old clothing and fabric by hand; in this story they are the central disputed heirlooms, representing the family's living history versus decorative display.

noun · Chapter 1

priceless

So valuable — emotionally or historically — that no money amount can measure it; used here to describe handmade heirlooms whose worth comes from family memory, not the market.

adjective · Chapter 1

organdy

A thin, stiff, sheer cotton fabric, often used for decorative clothing; its appearance here signals Dee's fashionable, showy dress that contrasts with her family's plain rural life.

noun · Chapter 1

sidle

To move sideways or edge along cautiously, often to avoid drawing attention; used to describe a character's hesitant, self-conscious way of approaching or positioning herself.

verb · Chapter 1

furtive

Done in a secretive, sneaky way, as if trying not to be noticed; describes a character's quick, hidden glances or movements that reveal discomfort or hidden intention.

adjective · Chapter 1

Afro

A rounded, full hairstyle in which natural hair is allowed to grow out in a large, spherical shape; in the 1970s context of this story it is a symbol of Black cultural pride and political identity.

noun · Chapter 1

homely

Plain or unattractive in appearance; used here without cruelty but honestly, as the narrator describes her own or another character's looks in straightforward, unsentimental terms.

adjective · Chapter 1

scalded

Burned or damaged by very hot liquid or steam; here it refers to the fire that injured one of the characters, leaving lasting physical and psychological scars.

verb · Chapter 1

cow dung

The solid waste dropped by cattle; mentioned as part of the rural farmyard setting and the narrator's matter-of-fact relationship with hard physical farm life.

noun · Chapter 1

real life

Used ironically here to contrast Dee's romanticized, performative idea of Black rural heritage with the mother's and Maggie's actual daily lived experience of poverty and hard work.

phrase · Chapter 1

oppress

To keep people down through unjust use of power or authority; referenced in the context of Dee's newly adopted political consciousness and her rejection of names she associates with historical subjugation.

verb · Chapter 1

auction block

The raised platform where enslaved people were publicly sold during American slavery; invoked here as part of the family's deeper ancestral history tied to the quilts and their fabric scraps.

noun · Chapter 1