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Mothers in Everyday Use and Two Kinds

            In the stories "Everyday Use " and "Two Kinds,"" the parents heavily try to influence their children's future in order for them to be successful. Each parent tries in their own way to mold their child into the person they envision them becoming in the future. However, the children did not necessarily do what their parents wanted, even though they did gain some of the attributes intended from their parent's ideals. While it's impossible to always get exactly what they want, parents shape the character of their children as they grow into adults. The daughter in Amy Tan's "Two Kinds " began her life completely sold on her mother's ideas about of success and being a "prodigy"." "In all of my imaginings, I was filled with a sense that I would soon become perfect. My mother and father would adore me. I would be beyond reproach. I would never feel the need to sulk for anything" (Tan 336). These high expectations are a direct result from her mother's insistence on becoming academically great. Her mother, being an immigrant, must play a huge role because she had sacrificed so much to give her a great opportunity in America; something she would never see in China. She even begins the story by saying "My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America" (Tan 336). This sets an early tone for how her mother treats her. Her mother fully expects her to grow up and be what her mother wants her to be. .
             The relationship between the mother and her two children in "Everyday Use"" brings two separate and almost opposite mother-daughter relationships into play. This story is more focused on the mother and how she grows to realize what type of relationship she values more. In the beginning of her daughter Dee's life she finds a way to give her all the tools to be more successful than anyone in her family previously had ever been. However Dee's condescending attitude made their lives difficult; "She washed us in a river of make-believe, burned us with a lot of knowledge we didn't necessarily need to know.


Essays Related to Mothers in Everyday Use and Two Kinds

1. Everyday Use

Everyday Use In the short story "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker the title ties into the issues about the quilts. ... Dee feels she deserves them more because she won't put them to everyday use. ... From down the line Grandma Dee and Big Dee created their quilts for everyday use and that's what Maggie wants to continue. Dee actually is putting the quilts to everyday use also by having them displayed for their appearance. ... Walker is also showing us that there are always two kinds of people in a family, those who do and those who don't. ...

  • Word Count: 648
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

2. Mother and Daughter in Two Kinds

"Two Kinds" is a story of a mother and a daughter living a life of high expectation in America which has always been looked at as the the country where dreams come true. ... Expectations have two sides, they either lead to achievement or disappointment. ... But, I still knew I did not want to live up to those low expectations so I knew I would have to work extremely hard and practice everyday. ... I had been doubted by many but I never let their low expectations bring me down, I used them as motivation. ... I had done the opposite of Ni Kan and used my failures as a push to work har...

  • Word Count: 1526
  • Approx Pages: 6
  • Grade Level: High School

3. Theme in Everyday Use

In "Everyday Use" Alice Walker reveals a conflict between a mother, Mrs. Johnson, and her two daughters. ... But to her mother, the name "Dee" is symbolic of family unity. ... (Walker 90) Dee and Maggie have two different ways of viewing their heritage. ... "Everyday Use" Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. 6th Ed. ...

  • Word Count: 416
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Grade Level: High School

4. Everyday use

"Everyday use" - by Alice Walker Identity is something that concerns everyone of us whether we like it or not. ... Her short story "Everyday use", written in 1973 draws on her own background, but also has a lot to say about the black female identity. ... Her mother describe her physics like this: "Have you ever seen a lame animal, perhaps a dog run over by some careless person rich enough to own a car, sidle up to someone who is ignorant enough to be kind to him? ... Another important evidence of the two sisters" search for an identity, besides the camera, is an old quilt done by the...

  • Word Count: 1135
  • Approx Pages: 5
  • Grade Level: High School

5. Everyday Use

She was delighted that they still used them. The food really didn't have a great value to the author or Maggie because they were so used to eating it everyday. ... The two quilts mentioned in the story were very special to the author for they were made from scraps of Grandma Dee's dresses over fifty years ago. ... Maggie and her mother live in a simple old southern kind of culture. Mother is always working outside doing things a man would usually do showing her independent sides and how they both put in a snuff at the end of the day showing that they are both non feminine kind of ...

  • Word Count: 722
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

6. The Point of View in Everyday Use

In the short story "Everyday Use," a first-person narrative is used. The mother in "Everyday Use" tells the story and tries to explain to the reader the great differences between her two daughters, Dee and Maggie. ... Dee's schooling seems to have distanced her from her mother and from Maggie: 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. ... When Momma states that she has been saving the quilts for Maggie when she marries, Dee becomes offended and says th...

  • Word Count: 1091
  • Approx Pages: 4
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

7. Everyday Use by Alice Walker

Everyday Use By Alice Walker The place where you hang your hat, where the heart is, is a link to the past, and through its door one walks into the future: home can be many things t one person. ... In "Everyday Use", Alice Walker explores the importance of home to a family of three women in Georgia. ... Walker uses Mama to characterize her daughters and herself in an unbiased light that only a mother could love or know. ... "Have you ever seen a lame animal, perhaps a dog, run over soem careless person, sidle up to someone who is ingorant enough to be kind to them?"... Walker linked these chara...

  • Word Count: 877
  • Approx Pages: 4
  • Grade Level: High School

8. Everyday Use by Alice Walker

Alice Walker's short story, "Everyday Use," is a story that revolves around the themes of womanhood, family, sibling rivalry, race, and heritage. ... Dee "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," whereas when Maggie reads aloud, "she stumbles along good-naturedly but can't see well. ... " Taking the dasher from her for a moment, the mother feels the wooden handle with her hands and reflects on "where hands pushing the dasher up and down to make ...

  • Word Count: 1002
  • Approx Pages: 4
  • Has Bibliography

9. Literature Analysis - Girl and Everyday Use

Clearly as seen in both Alice Walker's "Everyday Use" and Jamaica Kincaid's "Girl", motherhood can be a difficult and heartbreaking thing. Whether it be because a mother pushes a daughter to hard to become something she may fear in herself or whether it be a mother whose sacrifice and kind nature is overlooked by a more educated, yet self absorbed daughter, motherhood is complicated and is full on conflict. ... Dee treats her mother and sister like objects by using them as a kind of relics in her photographs. ... It is with this harsh and demeaning language where ...

  • Word Count: 1588
  • Approx Pages: 6
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

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