At 9:00 pm on April 23, 2016, Beyoncé released her visual album “Lemonade”. As I was sitting there, watching and listening to the emotional display of love and betrayal, I noticed that the album also has a lot to do with women’s rights and black rights. Throughout the album, Beyoncé uses a wide range of references to other art, music, and history to illustrate the struggles of women and African Americans today. “The most disrespected person in America is the black woman. The most unprotected person in America is the black woman. The most neglected person in America is the black woman.” This is a quote from Malcolm X that is in the “Lemonade” visual album. Beyoncé used a real recording of Malcolm X’s voice which I think makes the message very …show more content…
The music video has a scene showing a wall with the words “Stop Shooting Us” spray painted on it. There is also a part in the visual album that shows mothers of police brutality victims holding a picture of their deceased child. One the ladies is the mother of Trayvon Martin, who was a black 17 year old shot in Florida by a neighborhood watch captain. This demonstrates Beyoncé’s concern and desire for change of the recent unfortunate events involving blacks and police brutality. Amid the endless list of songs nowadays about partying, sex, and drugs, Beyoncé came out with an amazing piece of art that is her album “Lemonade”. Underneath her beautiful voice and catchy beats, there is a politically and emotionally fueled message about injustices towards women and African Americans. Being as popular and influential as she is, Beyoncé is doing a great thing bringing light to these issues. In closing, I would encourage you to listen to Beyoncé’s new album “Lemonade” and also to get out of your own little world, realize what is going on around you, and take a stand for what you believe
Double-consciousness, as coined by W.E.B. DuBois, refers to the struggle of oppressed groups in an oppressed society, and viewing those struggles through the eyes of the majority. Despite its incarnation over a hundred years ago, it is still just as relevant to today’s society as America still struggles with racial injustice and oppression. Beyoncé Knowles, one of the most prolific music artists of the 21st century, examines these injustices in her controversial visual album, Lemonade, which highlights the struggle of minorities through culture, oppression, and feminism, using imagery and song.
Originating from the beginning of the African American hardship in the United States, there have been different works of protest art that come from influential figures who attempted to adjust the ways of society. During times of slavery in the 1800’s, Frederick Douglass was a figure who brought upon staggering realizations and provided regular citizens a new consciousness regarding the truth of slavery. In the mid-20th Century when racism was burning throughout the country, Malcolm X took a powerful and compelling stance that induced a sense of fury and urgency among the African American audience. In today’s America, where the so-called “afterimages” of racism linger, Beyonce has implanted a sense of empowerment among the African American community through her music. In order for these
Lemonade is presented as the creation of one woman, but why is this so important? This is a ruling class ideal of being a “self-made man”. The ideals that go with a self-made person is that all of the arrangements in society are natural. You have to accept the social order and not seeing the background she came up from and presenting herself as a representative of the working class is a false image. She travels in a private jet now and is one of the most successful African American women and not acknowledging any sort of struggle with making the American dream during the video makes her image seem natural and easy. Media according to Marxists is supposed to act as an “apologist for the ruling class in an effort to avert class conflict and to prevent changes to political order”. Her anger in the video is against the men in her life which also happen to be black. Rather than the white society that put herself in a position that made her accession society so difficult. Blaming African American males is something that white culture has done for years. Spouting hateful ideas like thinking it was a choice for the African American male to go to jail and not be supportive to their families. In this video the African American males are stereotypes of racist ideals that the white racists would agree with. The African American women is safer so she is allowed a role in society. Not
Although the critically acclaimed album titled Lemonade received positive feedback for the way its visuals captured the struggles of black Americans, specifically black women, there is one song off the album that obviously emphasizes the adversities they are facing. In the beginning of the first verse of Freedom (featuring Kendrick Lamar), she uses the imagery of storm to reference her struggle towards being free. This is a reoccurring theme throughout the song, she continues to use words that are synonymous to disaster and generally negative.
Beyonce, since infancy, has meticulously engineered her moniker to be adjacent to, in her respect, diety-like royalty. Seemingly injected with an air of sophistication since birth, many people are simply fascinated by the duality of her ipseity; she is aesthetically attractive and an activist for the women empowerment movement--more so evocative through her art rather than through her "off camera" life. But Beyonce possesses a rare magic every artist of color wishes they had which is her race is rarely a factor in people's decision to listen to her or not. In fact, not so long ago I found myself at a gathering with friends and a Beyonce song came on. Of course, commentary buzzed around the room, and I heard something that stuck out to me--someone said they forgot she was "black."
For nearly twenty years, Beyoncé has lived her life in the public eye yet she has always kept her cool, been submissive, and rather quiet when it came to her personal endeavors however after releasing the film “Lemonade”, we are able to see her in a vulnerable light. In Jeremy Helliger’s article: “Dear Beyhive: Stop Whining. Beyoncé Still Hasn’t Earned Her Album Of The Year Grammy” he addresses the idea that although Beyoncé was able to encourage black women to be proud and free, she also she missed the mark by adding raunchy, over the top content to her vulnerability.
The title of this piece informs the reader about what the content will hold and suggests that the author feels strongly about the injustice of black women in the hip-hop scene. Jennifer Mclune, the author, is an activist, librarian, and writer that resides in Washington, D.C. This particular piece appeared in Z Magazine Online, which is an independently founded magazine whose mission is to publish articles that go in depth when critiquing the social structures of society and pride themselves on being a predominant activist webpage. With these factors combined, it is clear that the author is qualified to have written such an essay. After reading the information presented about the
Over the past few years, racial tensions in America have heightened. During this period, Black America undergo the daily struggle of witnessing the killing of unarmed black men and women. Victims of these endless killings and police brutality, turned into one of many hashtags, which led to the formations of the Black Lives Matter movement. Solange Knowles, younger sister of Beyoncé, soul singer and songwriter was viewed as the angry black woman. Solange used her platform to speak up. She became the most outspoken black artist for black activism in recent years. She embodies the image of a carefree black girl who is willing to let the world know that she is proud of her blackness.
The author of the album LEMONADE is R&B singer Beyoncé Knowles-Carter. Her background sort of does create bias, because she is mostly known for writing love/breakup songs. The authority that I can attribute to her is power. She is a very well known in music and entertainment. I believe the purpose of this album was to tell a story of how you can take all of your obstacles in life and turn them into something great. The title and message says when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. It also has other messages that coincide with each song along with the visuals. Current and past events most definitely could have inspired this work. Such as, her marriage, her parent’s marriage and life in general. The intended audience is obviously her fans but it can also be for people who has had similar dilemmas. She displays her tone by the melody of the music along with the lyrics. The visuals also send the tone of the message.
Beyoncé’s Lemonade deep expression of her artistic talents. In my opinion, this is best work to date due to the depth of the project. It only made sense to premiere the visual album on HBO, the king of prestige television. Lemonade on the surface sheds light into the life of Beyoncé, allowing fans to be exposed into her life more than ever. Beyoncé highlights her feeling on the highly-published infidelity of her father and former manager, Matthew Knowles as well as sharing that her husband Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter was allegedly doing the same thing as her father. This exposure of Beyoncé captivates the viewer, However, this purely a metaphor for what Lemonade is about. Lemonade is regarding the relationship between the World and the Black woman.
Beyonce is an African American female artist making incorporating empowering messages for women around the world. She is creating work that speaks to an audience that might not receive authentic mainstream. Beyonce ultimate goal is to visually and sonically entice wisdom through her music. Recently in a shocking video release, Beyonce debuted a new song “Formation” as well as a politically charged music video. This song was an uproar in the music industry worldwide. Millions of people around the world negatively viewed this song as a controversy. The music video and song caused many people to debate and cause a worldwide conflict.
Beyoncé Knowles, a well-known singer, songwriter uses two of her songs: “Freedom” and “Formation” to tell the story of herself. “Freedom” is the beginning of her story where she is searching for freedom and equality showing that there is still much inequality and injustice for African Americans in America today. The song slowly transitions to a more positive tone when she seems to have made something beneficial out of her difficult situation. “Formation,” however, has a completely different tone. While she does address negative situations from the past at the beginning of the song, she quickly transitions to a more positive tone full of pride in where she came from, who she has become, and what she has overcome. Together, the two songs
Queen Latifah’s “Ladies First” argues that women are strong in society through her visual and lyrical components of the song. During the beginning of the video, the video displays pictures of influential black females. These women include Harriet Tubman, Angela Davis, and others (0:00 - 0:05). These are strong influential women who impacted history. By showing these women, Latifah shows
Beyoncé, one of the most famous entertainer, singer, actresses of our time released her sixth album in April that is still topping the charts, holding #9 on Billboard Top 200 albums of 2016. Queen Bey’s album, “Lemonade”, is second to none. The edgy music choice, the dauntless lyrics, and the relatable visuals released with the album portraying a women scorned made this album jaw-dropping. Lemonade is a musical diary and was definitely well received.
On April 23, Beyonce and Warsan Shire debuted an empowering visual album titled Lemonade in an HBO special dedicated to Black women. It depicted the journey of self-knowledge and healing through stages over a period of time; in the following order intuition, denial, anger, apathy, emptiness, loss, accountability, reformation, forgiveness,resurrection, hope, and redemption. Within each segment lies a woman dealing with her internal demons, societal pressure set against her, her relationship to those close to her, and the connection that she has to the world around her. All the while using haunting imagery to emphasize the power of her story that connects her to the past, present, and future through the art of cinematography, music and poetry.