What are the values that are most important to Dee as opposed to those of Maggie in Alice Walker's story, "Everyday Use?"

In 's short
story, "," Dee and Maggie are very different people, which becomes evident as they
disagree over two old quilts that both young women want.

Dee has left her
family's roots behind as she has gone off to college and become a "woman of the
world." She has taken an African name, indicating that she has left behind her connection
to her American heritage. She is only interested in having her grandmother's quilts because they
would look nice hanging in her home. Dee has no sentimental attachment to
the quilt made by her grandmother.

On the other hand, Maggie's sentiments are
very different. She greatly values the quilts because they do represent her
connection to her grandmother and the African-American culture she is rooted in. She lives with
her mother; they have very little. The quilts represent her family's past, and she feels deeply
connected to the past through the quilts.

After dinner Dee
(Wangero) went to the trunk at the foot of my bed and started rifling through it...Out came
Wangero with two quilts. They had been pieced by Grandma Dee and then Big Dee and me had hung
them on the quilt ftames on the ftont porch and quilted them...In both of them were scraps of
dresses Grandma Dee had worn fifty and more years ago. Bits and pieces of Grandpa Jattell's
Paisley shirts. And one teeny faded blue piece, about the size of a penny matchbox, that was
from Great Grandpa Ezra's uniform that he wore in the Civil War.

The quilts become a point of contention between the two girls. Dee argues that Maggie
won't appreciate them, though their mother has promised them to her younger daughter:

'Maggie can't appreciate these quilts!' she said. 'She'd probably be
backward enough to put them to everyday use.'

'I reckon she would,' I said.
'God knows I been saving 'em for long enough with nobody using 'em. I hope she will!'

'...But they're priceless!' she was saying now, furiously; for she has a temper.
'Maggie would put them on the bed and in five years they'd be in rags. Less than
that!'

Maggie, who is soon to be married, is willing to
give up the quilts to settle the dispute, saying that she does not need the quilts to remember
her grandmother.

"She can have them, Mama," she
said, like somebody used to never winning anything, or having anything reserved for her. "I
can 'member Grandma Dee without the quilts."

At this
point, the girls' mother, Mrs. Johnson, takes the quilt from Dee and gives it to Maggie. Mrs.
Johnson is also rooted in the African-American past that defines who they
are: not descendants of slaves, as Dee contends, but as the children of the children of slaves
who have cut a life out for themselves in the United States, despite the fact that they arrived
here unwillingly.

Ironically, Dee believes that she has left the past behind
and found a way to connect to her African heritage, which means nothing to her personallythat is
not truly her heritage.

...[Dee] scorns her immediate
roots in favor of a pretentious "native African" identity.

Dee rejects the heritage forced on her by "the people who
oppress me."

Maggie, however, does not bear resentment to the people in
the past that she has never known, but remains connected to her family, especially her
grandmother. She is happily grounded in the tradition her ancestors have left for her, providing
her a connection to those she loves.