By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Women’ is a 1970 poem by Alice Walker (born 1944), one of the best-known African American writers of the second half of the twentieth century. Although she is probably most famous for her 1982 novel The Color Purple, Walker has written short stories and numerous other novels. She also started out her published career as a poet.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Everyday Use’ is one of the most popular and widely studied short stories by Alice Walker. It was first published in Harper’s Magazine in 1973 before being collected in Walker’s short-story collection In Love and Trouble.
Walker uses ‘Everyday Use’ to explore different attitudes towards Black American culture and heritage. You can read the story here before proceeding to our summary and analysis of Walker’s story below.