Ruben Genao – “Moving Beyond Pain”

In the analysis “Moving Beyond Pain” the author points out a criticizes the grows and glows of Beyonce’s album Lemonade. In the analysis the author points out one of the glows of the video,  “Obviously Lemonade positively exploits images of black female bodies—placing them at the center, making them the norm. In this visual narrative, there are diverse representations (black female bodies come in all sizes, shapes, and textures with all manner of big hair). Portraits of ordinary everyday black women are spotlighted, poised as though they are royalty.” the author also points out how Beyoncé is wearing rather casual clothing than the other women in the video. At first, this confused me but then I realized it was a clever way to draw attention away from her and more into the image of the black body. In the analysis, the author also states how the video constructs black female sisterhood and changes how we see the female black body “it shifts the gaze of white mainstream culture. It challenges us all to look at a new radical revision of how we see the black female body”. The author also points out cons of the music video stating “Even though Beyoncé and her creative collaborators daringly offer multidimensional images of black female life, much of the album stays within a conventional stereotypical framework, where the black woman is always a victim. “. In the video a scene of a character smashing cars after being betrayed by her man portraying all black females to be this way. The author responds to this by saying “Contrary to misguided notions of gender equality, women do not and will not seize power and create self-love and self-esteem through violent acts”.

One point I agree with in the analysis is when she said “Female violence is no more liberatory than male violence. And when violence is made to look sexy and eroticized, as in the Lemonade sexy-dress street scene, it does not serve to undercut the prevailing cultural sentiment that it is acceptable to use violence to reinforce domination, especially in relations between men and women. Violence does not create positive change”. Violence should never be an option in a relationship no matter if it’s done by a man or women, in all cases it is wrong.

Comments ( 3 )

  1. Edward Mendoza
    I see where you are coming from with your reasoning, as I also agree when she said that violence would never be the answer to something like that. Additionally, the glows that she points out in beyonce's music video, like the empowerment of black female bodies and the normalization of black women, also helps to support her case.
  2. Jamirka De León
    Great job at summarizing the article, you kept it short and understandable. I found it very interesting when you said that the dress helps draw attention to the female body. I never thought about it like this when reading the article, I saw it as a way to sexualize women because it was a topic that the author discussed throughout her writing. I also think it was good of you to include where the author calls the audience to action, the video Lemonade is not enough to fix the situation. Great job Ruben.
  3. Maximo Martinez Grullon
    I liked the way you analyzed Hook's main points like, the way Beyonce portrays black women on her musinc videos, and how its related to self acceptance. Also how you also added Hook's claim on how the album lemonade also talks about the empowerment and sisterhood of black women. But one thing that I didn't liked about this post was that in the second paragraph, how even though you introduced something that confused you, you didn't really explained it. You just took one of the quotes (that I really also liked by the way, since it talks how violence shouldn't be celebrated). But you didn't do a proper explanationf or analysis for it.

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