It’s been a month since Beyoncé dropped a surprise new album, and yeah, I won’t ever be over it. It was a move of pure spunk and genius, sure, but when Bey released the self-titled visual album, she gifted the world with a two-hour love song for black women. After a year filled to the brim with absolute tomfoolery surrounding black women, she ended it by delivering one of the most beautiful clap backs anyone’s seen in a while.
There are plenty of people who’ve leveled considerable critique against Beyoncé and her album, most of it from burnt white feminists who seemed awfully jealous that their Lena Dunhams and Sheryl Sandbergs have yet to match Bey’s flawlessness, but some of it is valid. Beyoncé’s album is worth the attention, even the negative vibes haters gave off. It shed much-needed light on how black women are treated and the role(s) we’re expected to fulfill.
Perhaps a refresher course? Robin Thicke has a black wife and, while promoting “Blurred Lines,” talked about how much of a pleasure it was to degrade women. Lily Allen had the audacity to sing about how women are objectified and slut-shamed and how she wouldn’t twerk because she’s intelligent, all while mockingly dancing alongside black video vixens. A white feminist decided that it was her place to say that Michelle Obama is a disgrace to feminism for taking on a domestic role as First Lady, ignoring the loaded history of black women and family, discounting the narratives Mrs. O subverts about black womanhood and motherhood in that position.
We could talk forever about Miley Cyrus’ cultural appropriation shenanigans. Don’t forget how the same white women who praised Lena Dunham for her chronic nudity on Girls, calling it a bold statement about female sexuality, started whining about how Bey’s amazing laser-cut leather bodysuit in her Super Bowl halftime show was anti-woman and pandered to the male gaze.
Listen. There are some things not-so-awesome about Beyoncé – like Jay Z’s verse in “Drunk In Love,” where he references domestic abuse in a song about being, well, super-duper in love. I’m not fond of that nonsense in a song celebrating black relationships. Barring the few other hiccups on the album, it’s just about perfect.
Beyoncé is about a black woman who’s aware of her power (“***Flawless”); who also enjoys the security she has to be vulnerable (“Drunk In Love”). It’s about a “good” black woman who’s learned to enjoy her sexuality. “Blow” and “Partition” sound like yet more freak-nasty songs, but for us black women like Bey who’re always plagued with fear of being carefree black girls while struggling to become one, who’ve been raised to be proper ladies, with every cultural expectation within and outside the black community that comes with, it’s brazenly thrilling.
It’s about a black woman finding fulfillment in being a mother (“Blue”) and also unapologetically taking pride in her hard-won independence (“Grown Woman”). Bey leaves room for queer black girls: For one, the video for “Haunted” is bold commentary about so-called deviant sexuality with black lady queers front and center. “XO” doesn’t mention gender at all. Bey calls herself a feminist at least twice in two different languages. Feminism should be humbled to have black women at its party.
BEYONCÉ is a multilayered and intelligent work of art. More importantly, it’s a work that doesn’t make caricatures of black women, refuses to marginalize or compartmentalize or undermine any part of our experiences – not our sexualities, not our relationships with their families and significant others, not our emotions.
Beyoncé is a person, in all of her gritty and complex and beautiful glory, which might seem so obvious as to not warrant mention, but which black women have a disturbing lack of in our representation. Beyoncé isn’t every black woman, but she’s a lot of us, and all of us can share in this album in some capacity.
Samaria Johnson is a senior majoring in history. Her column runs biweekly on Mondays.
