Take Your Power Back

Liliana Kelson and Sebastian Gasparo

Over the course of time, what it means to be a woman has changed. The “typical” female role has changed. “Typical” female clothing has changed. Job opportunities have changed. Everything has changed in some way or another but that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for more change. All of the progress that has been made connects back to power or lack thereof. The power of the man which weakens the woman.

A prime example of just how powerful men can be is a woman fearing for her life simply because there is a man walking behind her on a quiet street at night. The only reason she fears him is that he is a man. She doesn’t even know him. But she doesn’t have to in order to feel the fear.

This blog post explores how Beyonce depicts her taking her power back as a woman and a wife in Anger and how poet Warsan Shire discusses the female struggle with the male power dynamic.

Beyonce in “Anger” (left) and poet Warsan Shire (right)

Chapter three of the Lemonade visual album is called “Anger”. In this section, Beyonce is expressing all of her emotions that have come as a result of her rocky relationship with her husband, Jay-Z. Throughout this section, there is a focus on being a powerful woman. Beyonce is taking her power back, illustrating that she will not stand by and watch as Jay-Z cheats. She says, “This is your final warning. You know I give you life. If you try this shit again you gon’ lose your wife,” asserting her power and laying down the law.

Beyonce chose to include a quote in this section from Malcolm X, a Civil Rights Activist. She does this because of his influence on the ideology that framed the Black Panther Party. The Black Panther Party was a group made up of Black individuals who defended themselves to make the changes that they rightly deserved. The party was formed because the white supporters who wanted to give Black individuals the rights they deserved, weren’t trying hard enough to end the systematic racism that was happening at the time.

Similarly, Beyonce is saying that she doesn’t need Jay-Z’s money and that she can take care of herself. She realized her power as a woman and doesn’t need anything for anyone anymore. Beyonce also implies that if Jay-Z doesn’t put all of his time and dedication into the relationship, she will leave him for the next man that treats her like she should be treated.

She knows the power she possesses as a Black woman. She goes on to show others that she won’t let anything stand in her way and if something does interfere, she will destroy it and move on.

“Fire” by Warsan Shire

Feminist poet Warsan Shire’s poems touch on important components of feminism and women exercising their power. In the poem “Fire,” Shire discusses how her mother stood up for her father in a way that clearly complexed her. She shares how her mother excuses the abuse her father inflicted upon them, saying “he pays the bills” and “comes home at night”, “what more do you want.” Obviously, this struck Shire as surprising and wrong, being something that stuck with her throughout her life. Shire’s feminist perspective adds to this poem and allows the reader to understand that Shire recognized this interaction as “wrong”. This recognition of power dynamics that Shire expresses connects back to the idea that women are often stripped of their power and their freedoms and although it shouldn’t have to be this way and it is not always possible, women often have to stand up for themselves in order to gain that power back or have it in the first place.

Please take a minute to watch this video making sure you pay attention to the words in pink as well as the visuals.

The song Flawless by Beyonce is a prime example of her feminism and desire to give women power. Beyonce was inspired to write the song after listening to a TED talk titled, “We Should all be Feminists,” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and decided to use some of the lines in her song.

We teach girls to shrink themselves

To make themselves smaller

We say to girls

“You can have ambition

But not too much

You should aim to be successful

But not too successful

Otherwise you will threaten the man”

Because I am female

I am expected to aspire to marriage

I am expected to make my life choices

Always keeping in mind that

Marriage is the most important

Now marriage can be a source of

Joy and love and mutual support

But why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage

And we don’t teach boys the same?

We raise girls to each other as competitors

Not for jobs or for accomplishments

Which I think can be a good thing

But for the attention of men

We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings

In the way that boys are

Feminist: the person who believes in the social

Political, and economic equality of the sexes

When the lines are spoken by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in the second verse of the song, the mood changes. The background music quiets down and the tone of her voice makes what she is saying sound important and empowering. The words used are very powerful because they preach that young girls shouldn’t be taught to be inferior to boys, but rather that both girls and boys should be taught the same foundational values in order to strive towards gender equality starting young.