African-American culture Essay Example for Free

African-American horti last EssayEveryday Use by Alice pusher centers in the recital between a Mother and her children with conflicting ideas on cultural and ancestral saving (Mohr). The bewilder who was draw in the stratum as an uneducated, big-boned adult female with rough, man-working hands who lived in a rural locality depicted a typical black woman during the 1950s-1960s. The story opens as she waited for her twain daughters, Dee and Maggie, as they arrived home from the city studying in a university. Upon their arrival at home, they had a dustup over the self-control of an heirloom quilt. The piece illustrates several levels of meaning. There were various symbolism employed by the writer. The possession of the quilt which the whole story revolved around symbolizes the traditional history and the art of the African-American culture, and to their woman to be specific. Their traditional art gives emphasis on abstract designs as shown by the quilt (Mohr). Moreover, it attractively creates a transition where something as unimportant and as invaluable as a quilt contained a rich and valued importance such as a cultural representation as the story unfolded.The use of Mrs. Johnson as the point of view in this story has a vital role in how the author contrasted the love for culture as opposed to Mrs. Johnsons daughter Dees who showed less cost towards their Black heritage. Her description as a mother symbolizes the general older generation of the African-American culture while on the other hand her daughters who were then educated in college was a representation of the flow (new breed) generation. The dispute over the quilt reflects the two sides of the Black societies.Because of the hidden meanings in the story, there will be several ways one can use in order to explain and interpret the story. The mother experienced a lot of confusions and at the same time the incident revealed to her, her daughters contradictory understanding towards their li neage. She described her daughter Maggie like a dog run over by some careless individual rich enough to own a car, that is, she recognized her daughter as unsophisticated plainly loyal (like a dog), as opposed to Dee who see saw as burned us with a lot of knowledge.This description mirrored Dees central role in the story which is a representation of the materialistic and complicated modern Black who was caught in the confusing web between acknowledging her culture and the fitting in trend that was prevalent after the Black Power Movement (Ogbar). Even with the contrasted description, Mrs. Johnson mulish to give the quilt to Maggie she thus confirmed and affirmed her younger daughters idea of self-worth and at the same time revealed her own concept through Maggies personality.Another important highlight in the story is the analogy between the names of Dee and to that of their Grandmother Dee and this ultimately set the comparison between Dee and her grandmother. The similarity in the name suggests that they came from the same race but the obvious distinction in their characters showed the degree of the run of the whites culture to Dee and the preservation efforts by Grandmother Dee as exemplified by doing traditional quilting. The story Everyday Use is a reflection of the authors early life.Alice Walker who was involved in the efforts of cultural preservation used literature as a device to convey her position and assurance as a Black African American in their turbulent period of struggle for equality. This absolutely story took place in a setting almost the same as the place where she grew up in Georgia. More striking parallelism is on the character of Maggie Johnson, like Maggie, Alice Walker is also mar due to a gunshot wound. On the other hand, her similarities with Dee are reflected in their exemplary intelligence which both gained them scholarships in universities.As observed in this story, Alive Walker blatantly expressed her views and judgments t owards this racial dissimilitude and this story was as effective as it is since this is reflective of her life, therefore the feelings associated with it has deep connection to her. Art, for example writing, as I stressed in the introduction is one of the effective vessel that carries your thoughts when you dont destiny to deliberately express an unaccepted idea and also, it is a helpful tool for conveying a absolute message at the same time entertaining.