Race and Femininity

I realised about 700 words into my last blog posts about Music Video and the Politics of Representation that I would not be able to expand on the topic of race enough to give it justice. So I decided to make a contained case study post, applying the thesis of he chapter Music Video in Black and White: Race and Femininity to an intertextual look at Beyoncés work. Railton distinguishes the difference between black and white femininity through its cultural, colonial context.

We argue that patterns of raced imagery that emerged from, and were consolidated in, Victorian discourses of colonialism and imperialism and which functioned historically to uphold and legitimate white privilege, continue to inform the very different ways in which black people and white people are presented in contemporary popular culture generally and music videos in particular.

The Victorian discourses of race are brought up periodically, even in the section dedicated to Beyoncés Baby Boy music video. This was in reference the the animalistic, savage and sexualised image of the African-American woman. Railton explained that whilst white women where unattainable, pure, and asexual, African-American women were likened to animals, with the buttocks and even genitalia being used to distinguish them as underdeveloped and primitive. By all accounts Baby Boy does appear to play into this stereotype, but I would make a case for intertextuality, and agree with Lorraine O’Grady in that such imagery can be used to ‘reclaim black female subjectivity so as to “de-haunt” historical scripts and establish worldly agency’. How can this case be made? With Beyoncés Formation, a cultural idol for feminism for the black woman.

Beyoncé doesn’t shy away from the aggressive sexuality associated with African-American women, however she does actively disrupt the Victorian discourses Railton references. As the imagery shifts between pre and post civil war America Beyoncé addresses both the history of his race’s enslavement and their continuing social oppression. The song itself is an expression of black pride as she outwardly states “I like my baby hair, with baby hair and afros. I like my negro nose with Jackson Five nostrils”, however the visuals are jarring; multiple shots feature her, along side other black women in classic Victorian dress, the very image of white female purity and a-sexuality. Here she subverts the necessity of her sexuality to her sex and inso doing sexually empowers herself rather than falling to objectification. She makes the “transition from an object to a subject of history”. This is not the only time she has done this as the photos released with the announcement of her pregnancy in 2016 incited the image of the Virgin Mary, the “model for the white woman”, as Railton puts it. These are active attempts on Beyoncés behalf to subvert the image of the black woman and break the barriers that exist between the racial definitions of femininity.

The song is an intricate “statement of radical black positivity”. Beyonce switches between oppressor and oppressed to upset the cultural discourse that still defines what it is to be an African-American woman. Railton contemplates that

the range of discourses available to black women might be expanded not only through the practices of artists, poets, and intellectuals but also, perhaps more crucially, through a more quotidian engagement with the products of popular culture.

Formation was a perfect example of the accuracy of this claim. Just the mention of the Red Lobster chain in the song’s bridge saw an increase in the restaurants sales by 33% upon the songs release. The song had an immense cultural impact and resonated profoundly with the greater African American community. The song was even performed at the Superbowl and became a major controversial talking point within the greater racial discourse in America. Since Railton wrote Music Video and the Politics of Representation, Beyonce has been elevated to the status of a queen (more like a goddess honestly) and has made an indisputable mark on not only race feminist discourse but also racial discourse as a whole in America.

the distinction between black and white femininity is obvious, but Cultural icons like Beyonce are actively altering the discourse surrounding what it means to be a black woman, and its through music videos like Formation that she is doing it.