themes applying symbols settings and point of view
Excerpt from Term Paper:
Alice Walker
Themes and Characterization in the short history “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker
American literature with the 20th century was reputed for its subsistence to ideologies that have proliferated for years, while society responded to act upon the continuing oppression and inequality that a lot of sectors from the society continue to experience actually during the period of modernism and sociable progress. One of those oppressed sectors of the society is the dark American sector, which is consisting of the African-Americans and second-generation African-Americans. The emergence with the 20th century, unfortunately, did not signal a big change in society’s perception and judgment of black Americans as this kind of sector ongoing to have prejudiced, unprivileged, and poor lives.
This element of American world was shown effectively in the short account “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker. In it, your woman mirrored the poverty and hardships black Americans needed to go through regardless of the relative progress society got experienced. It is vital to note that Walker did not intend to addresses and credit prejudice against black People in america to white Americans, but surprisingly and sadly, with her fellow dark-colored Americans as well, who have as well played a significant role in perpetuating and proliferating oppression against this sector of the culture.
Given this sociable reality that Walker represented in “Everyday Use, inches this paper provides an examination of the dominating themes and characterization shown in that. This daily news posits that “Everyday Use” was a story that dedicated to the continuous oppression of black People in the usa, primarily as the sector had been assimilated with American culture, influencing dark-colored Americans with the prejudice and judgmental attitude that society had always treated African-Americans, black Us citizens, and their local African heritage. Through the designs and characters depicted inside the story, Walker was able to highlight on this stage, creating the contrasting characters of Maggie and Dee to illustrate the animosity that exists between black Us citizens who have been carefully assimilated with American culture.
The story highlighted two dominant themes which have been essential in developing the characterization of Dee and Maggie. The first idea centered on the evident prejudiced held against black People in the usa by their fellow black Americans. It is apt to say that Walker intended to extend the message that black Americans, by simply holding prejudiced views against their fellow black People in the usa, perpetuated the prejudice and oppression against them. That is, the oppressed contributed to their particular oppression.
This kind of important idea was reflected early on in the story, where readers seen how Dee, being the educated family member, looked down on her mother and Maggie because of their poverty and not enough education. This kind of fact has not been unknown for the mother, who had been also the narrator from the story. In the mother’s personal words, the lady described how their ‘low status’ in life had been a source of disapproval and stress for Dee: “She used to read to us with no pity; pushing words, is situated, other folks’ habits, entire lives upon us two, sitting captured and ignorant underneath her voice. “
This verse reflected a lot about the mother’s mind and understanding of her life being a black American. For her, education was both equally a goal and a hurdle that taken advantage of and doomed her relatives. Educating Dee made her ‘immune’ towards the suffering her mother and her sister Maggie experienced; however , it was also the family’s curse, as the mother and Maggie involuntarily became manipulated and eventually succumbed to Dee’s dominant personality. Missing the education manufactured the mom submissive to Dee and her opinion about their lifestyle. Dee’s low regard on her and Maggie showed that they had as well succumbed to the social company of education, becoming ‘labeled’ people in whose selves happen to be determined by the society, particularly the educated category.
Though the mom and Maggie appeared obedient, compliant, acquiescent, subservient, docile, meek, dutiful, tractable to Dee, Walker described this tendencies of submissiveness as a type of oppression, an adverse behavior that have to not always be tolerated. Mcdougal made it obvious that training Dee was not a bad decision, but for Dee to challenge her friends and family just because they preferred to live simple, humble, rural, and traditional lives did not suggest they are virtually any lesser than Dee himself. This family members dynamics among the list of mother, Dee, and Margaret reflected the development of prejudice among learned dark Americans who have, in the course of obtaining their education, inevitably immersed themselves with all the dominant white-colored American contemporary society. This oppression by the oppressed themselves was aptly place by the mother, who reasoned, “She cleaned
