Feminism

Feminism is the ideology that believes in the equal rights and opportunities for women in education,
employment and in the cultural and social life. There are differences between the ideas of feminists
around the world so that no one description can fit all varieties of feminist views.

First Wave Feminism

 writers like Mary Wollstonecraft (A Vindication of the Rights of Women, 1792) highlight the
inequalities between the sexes. Activists like Susan B. Anthony and Victoria Woodhull contribute
to the women's suffrage movement, which leads to National Universal Suffrage in 1920 with the
passing of the Nineteenth Amendment.
 It focused on the promotion of equal rights for women. By the end of the nineteenth century,
the focus was more on political rights, particularly the right of women's suffrage.
 Women widely are considered to be:
Intellectually inferior
Physically weak
Emotional, intuitive, irrational
Suited to the role of wife and mother
Women could not vote
They were not educated at school/universities and could only work in manual jobs.
A married women’s property and salary were owned by her husband
Rape and physical abuse are legal within marriage
Divorce is available to men but far more difficult to women
When had no right to their children if they left a marriage
Abortion was illegal

Second Wave Feminism

 building on more equal working conditions necessary in America during World War II,
movements such as the National Organization for Women (NOW), formed in 1966, cohere
feminist political activism. Writers like Simone de Beauvoir (Le Deuxième Sexe, 1949) and Elaine
Showalter established the groundwork for the dissemination of feminist theories dove-tailed
with the American Civil Rights movement.
 Women widely are considered to be
Women could attend school and university
Women did not receive equal pay for the same work
It was easier to gain a divorce but socially frown upon
Rape and physically abuse within marriage were illegal but husbands were rarely convicted
Abortion was still illegal
Women’s body were objectified in advertising
Society is pathriarcal
Women may have legal rights but they are still treated as inferior.

Third Wave Feminism

  third wave feminism borrows from post-structural and contemporary gender and race theories (
to expand on marginalized populations' experiences. Writers like Alice Walker work to
"...reconcile feminism with the concerns of the black community...and the survival and
wholeness of her people, men and women both, and for the promotion of dialog and
community as well as for the valorization of women and of all the varieties of work women
perform"
 women in this period are considered to be
Women seem to be more equal to men
Women are no longer obligated to marry or have children, and marriage is more equal
The legal system is better at protecting women’s right.

Radical Feminism

 Patriarchy is a social system in which men hold primary power and predominate in roles of
political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal
societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.

Liberal Feminism

 Liberal feminism is a particular approach to achieving equality between men and women that
emphasizes the power of an individual person to alter discriminatory practices against women.
It aims for individuals to use their own abilities and the democratic process to help women and
men become more equal in the eyes of the law, in society and in the workplace.

Socialist Feminism

 Socialist feminists wanted to integrate the recognition of sex discrimination within their work to
achieve justice and equality for women, for working classes, for the poor, and all humanity. The
goal of socialist feminism is to work with men to achieve a level playing field for both genders.

Feminists Criticism

 Feminist literary criticism is concerned with "the ways in which literature (and other cultural
productions) reinforce or undermine the economic, political, social, and psychological
oppression of women"
 Feminist literary criticism is literary criticism informed by feminist theory, or more broadly, by
the politics of feminism. It uses the principles and ideology of feminism to critique the language
of literature.

Everyday USe

Exposition:

Maggie and Mama wait in the yard for Dee to arrive. Both of them are nervous because they perceive
Dee as better than they are although no one voices that opinion. From Mama's information, the reader
learns that Dee was never happy at home. Maggie was burned in a home fire. Dee seems to look down
at Maggie and her mother. The church paid for Dee to go to college. It is also evident that Mama is
proud of Dee in her intelligence and looks.
Rising Action

Dee arrives with her boyfriend wearing an "African outfit" and sporting gold earrings. She has changed
her name to an African name Wangero. Dee was named after her grandmother, so to drop the name
was to drop part of her heritage. To Mama, Wangero says that "Dee" is dead.

Climax

Mama finally realizes that Dee has come back for more than just a visit. She wants to have some of the
things that have been made or used in the family for generations. When Mama discovers that Dee
merely wants to use them as decorations to prove her African heritage, Mama does not like the idea.
Finally, when Dee wants the homemade quilts that the Grandmother Dee and she made, Mama tells her
"no" for the first time. She has promised the quilts to Maggie, and they are hers. Dee makes the remark
that Maggie will ruin them by using them everyday.

Falling Action

Maggie offers to give the quilts to Dee. However, Mama will not allow Dee to take part of her family
legacy just to show off and decorate her apartment. If she ruins them, they will make more. Maggie
remembers when the quilts were made, and the importance of them to the family.

Deneoument

Dee angrily gathers herself and tells Maggie that she needs to learn about her heritage. She also advises
her to make something of herself. When Mama looks at Maggie and realizes that this daughter is the
one who needs her and loves her, she realizes that Maggie appreciates her mother and the real family
heritage. The story ends with the mother for the first time showing Maggie affection.

Historical Biographical Content

“Everyday Use” is set in the late 1960’s or early 1970’s, a tumultuous time when many African
Americans were struggling to redefine and seize control of their social, cultural, and political identity in
American society.

 identifies three cycles of historical black women characters

 Its quilt is an emblem of American women's culture, as it is an object of communal construction
and female harmony. The quilt warms and protects our bodies it is passed down like mother's
wisdom from generation to generation; its designs mirror the most everyday but profound
concerns of all women-marriage, family, children, love.
 Walker poses problems of heritage in response to the black power movements of the 1960s in
which she grew up, especially the kind of cultural nationalism that demanded imitation of
features of the African past.
 contains women of all three cycles of his tory. Maggie does not know her worth; her mother
says she walks like "a lame animal, perhaps a dog run over by some careless person rich enough
to own a car." Dee inhabits the second cycle: though she seems to reject white society, she fails
to appreciate her own heritage until it becomes fashionable to do so. Though her mother
applauds Dee's personal strength, she is saddened by her embarrassment at Maggie, at herself,
and ather home.
