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

In Alice Walker's short story, "Everyday Use," 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.

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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:

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'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.

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"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 personally—that is not truly her
heritage.

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...[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.