Character Analysis
Prejudice and Pride
Talking in African dialect, changing her name, freaking out over a few quilts—what is going on with this character?
Dee's behavior when she first shows up at her mom's house might seem a little puzzling to us, but as lots of other literary critics have noted, it actually makes a lot of sense in the context of the Black Power and Black Pride movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Influenced by these movements, some members of the black community rejected the damaging, centuries-old message/belief that being black was a sign of inferiority by deliberately embracing and celebrating their African heritage. As epitomized in that popular slogan of the time—Black is Beautiful—being black was seen as a positive aspect of one's identity rather than a source of shame.
Embracing her African heritage is exactly what Dee seems to be doing, doesn't it? When she first gets out of the car, for instance, the narrator notices that she's all decked out in a long, flowy dress with "yellows and oranges enough to throw back the light of the sun," that looks a lot like traditional African garb.
According to the narrator's description, Dee also seems to be proudly sporting an Afro rather than straightening her hair to conform to white notions of beauty: "[Her hair] stands straight up like the wool on a sheep" (20). And let's not forget how she eschews Hello for the African Wa-su-zo-Tean-o when she greets her mother and sister.
By assuming the African name Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo, Dee takes this all a step further. As Dee herself explains, "I couldn't bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me" (27). When the narrator promptly reminds Dee that she was named after her aunt Dicie, Dee insists on getting all genealogical and tracing the source of the name further back.
And we all know where she's going with this one: Somewhere in the family tree, she's probably thinking, there was an enslaved person named Dee who was named after a (white) slave owner. Or, at the very least, that enslaved person was denied her African name and given a white person's name. And no way, no how is Dee going to let her new identity get all tainted with that legacy.
It's worth mentioning here that some readers have found Dee's obsession with Africa a bit sketchy. David Cowart and David White suggest, for instance, that Dee seems to participate in a cultural trend of the 1970s in which some black Americans reached to Africa for some "pure" source of identity rather than claiming an African American identity which carries all the bad baggage of slavery and Jim Crow.
The criticism of this tendency is that it seems to be something of a rejection of African American culture. Yes, slavery and segregation under Jim Crow were unquestionably horrible—but many African Americans showed bravery, character, creativity, and resourcefulness under those circumstances. So by identifying herself primarily with Africa, rather than, say, her crafty quilt-making aunt Dicie, Dee could be seriously dissing her African American roots.
On the other hand, Dee does seem to express an appreciation for the butter churn and the quilts, things that have been made and used by her African American relatives. So maybe she's just confused. And if "Everyday Use" is a story about the role that race plays in shaping identity (hint, hint), Dee's character gives us a good indication of just how complicated figuring out racial identity can be.
In any case, Dee is a character who is trying to affirm her blackness as a valuable part of who she is. And if we see Dee as a participant in the larger Black Pride movement that helped bring about an important shift in the way that black Americans were seen and treated, this could make her a pretty admirable character (kind of like Stokely Carmichael in a dress).
Except that's not really how the story goes down, now is it?
Is She for Real?
First of all, we can't help but question Dee's sincerity about her sudden appreciation for her old homestead and everything in it. Or, rather, the narrator repeatedly pushes us to question whether Dee truly respects these things she now claims to care so deeply about.
Take the quilts, for example. The narrator recalls that she offered Dee the very same quilts when she left for college and she turned her nose up at them, calling them "old-fashioned, out of style." The message the narrator sends is that Dee never had any reverence for the quilts before so this newfound appreciation for all things African seems just a little, well, fake (or at least suspicious). Is Dee just putting on some show because she went off to college, took an African Studies class, and learned that it was cool to like these things?
Along this line, we're also told that Dee is quite the fashionista, someone who keeps up with the latest styles. As critics like Donna Haisty Winchell have suggested, Dee could just be celebrating her heritage because it's fashionable to do so. The problem with that, of course, is that we all know how quickly stuff goes out of style (we're looking at you, shoulder pads…). If Dee ends up ditching her African style when it's no longer in vogue, that would be a diss with some pretty serious implications.
But let's give Dee a break for a second. Let's, in fact, give her the benefit of the doubt and suppose that she really has come to genuinely appreciate these artifacts. The way she treats her family still leaves little doubt that she is going about the process of claiming her heritage in a seriously questionable way.
Sure, she's happy to snap some pictures of her mother and sister in front of their dilapidated house to create some nice little cultural artifacts for herself, but we know from her meltdown at the end of the story that she feels way superior to the people in the picture. And speaking of that meltdown, note the nasty vibe from Dee as she demands that her mother give her the quilts:
But they're priceless! [Dee] was saying now, furiously; for she has a temper. (68)
Similarly, the narrator tells us:
Dee (Wangero) looked at me with hatred. (1518)
Dee is hostile and oppressive in her very quest to protest oppression. Did someone say hypocrite?
The Black Pride movement that Dee seems to be so influenced by was all about rightfully demanding respect for African Americans—yet Dee can't even show respect to her own mother and sister. She's so concerned with resisting social and cultural injustice that she doesn't think twice about acting unjustly to the people close to her, and the fact that she doesn't realize how messed up this is is Dee's most serious flaw.
Dee's Timeline