Elizabeth Crenshaw
E-Portfolio for English 1102-004
Is Beyonce A Feminist?
Celebrities are an influence to pretty much everyone worldwide, whether you like it or not. Try turning on the radio or a TV show, or even driving down the highway and not seeing or hearing something about somebody famous. Whether it’s the TV show they got their star role in, their hit song on the radio, or the sky-high billboards with a giant picture of their face, they are everywhere. That made me think, if you see them all over the place, shouldn’t they make sure they are promoting positive messages? Shouldn’t they use their fame to make a change for the better in the world? Start a movement? Really shouldn’t they be doing at least something that benefits society and not just themselves (this is a dig aimed at you, Kardashians)?
To go off that, my whole project is centered around Beyoncé and the debate whether she is a feminist or not. Beyoncé is on commercials (Pepsi), in movies (Dreamgirls, Obsessed, Austin Powers in Goldmember), almost every radio station, traveling for concert after concert, front cover of magazines, I mean, even if you are more of a CNN/Time than pop culture type, you see stories about her there too! She and husband Jay-Z are close with the Obamas and regularly are talked about with them. Whether it’s a fundraising dinner at the White House or the Obama girls (Michelle included!) rocking out at a Beyoncé concert. Beyoncé’s influential reach is so wide, it’s impossible to not hear about her. This is why I think she, along with other celebrities, should be promoting a positive image and using their instrumental power for the betterment of society.
As soon as I started looking into both the pro-feminist and skeptic views, I noticed that this was a very split debate with strong points on both sides. Everyone from esteemed news sources to blogs and magazines have something to say about it, and they are all divided. Beyoncé has gotten praise and criticism for some quotes, her lyrics, her music videos, her body, and a couple more other actions she’s done. In order to see more about the feminism debate of a specific issue, click the square that corresponds to that issue!
Conclusion
There are some things that Beyoncé does that absolutely promote feminism, like the use of the TED talk in ***Flawless and the article she wrote for The Shriver Report. On the other hand, the way she presents her body isn’t really something that is common for feminists. She might be presenting a slightly different view of feminism than others. An example would be Beyoncé versus Lady Gaga. Lady Gaga focuses more on the self-invention feminism as opposed to Beyoncé’s feminism operating within conditions of a constraint (Williams). But regardless, saying Beyoncé is or is not a feminist would be wrong. Because feminism is a multi-dimensional, messy, jumble of things, it would be nearly impossible to say someone is or is not a complete feminist. After looking at both sides of this Beyoncé debate, I see it as an example of just how messy feminism is supposed to be. As Heidi Lewis said, “I just want to try to keep [the conversation] messy and keep it complex because that's what [feminism] is” (Lewis).
You can’t say Beyoncé is or isn’t a feminist, partially because feminism is such a complex idea and partially because we shouldn’t be categorizing her into one specific box. There’s no such thing as a checklist for feminism where you’re a feminist if you check 6 or more of the 10 options. It’s far too messy and complex and difficult as a topic to be able to define all of someone’s actions into a yes or no. There is no such thing as a perfect feminist, where 100% of their actions are feminist. It is more of a, ‘try your best and hardest to strive for equality’ kind of movement. This is why we cannot put Beyoncé into this box- because it doesn’t exist!
On the other hand, we shouldn’t even be trying to define her off of her actions. Only Beyoncé can define who Beyoncé is. Why do we have to label her feminist or not? Beyoncé asked the same question, "Why do you have to choose what type of woman you are? Why do you have to label yourself anything? I'm just a woman and I love being a woman” (Ellison). Although I do believe celebrities should be a good influence, who are we to force them into a specific category? Feminists are supposed to be fighting with each other in order to aim for equality, and this debate makes feminists fight against each other (Crosley). Also there’s the fact that Beyoncé is somewhat new to the feminism field, so to look to her for all your information about the huge topic of feminism would be “irresponsible” (Lewis). She should be promoting a positive message because people are more likely to listen to Beyoncé than take a gender studies class, but on the other hand, she isn’t responsible to teach her listeners about feminism.
Feminism is such an important movement, and I’m really glad there is such a huge discussion about it going on, even if it is revolving around Beyoncé and other celebrities. This way, people are going to be hearing about it and learning about what it really means. The best way to get the message out is to keep on talking!
Beyoncé has been thrust into the feminism spotlight, whether she is a good representation of feminism or not. She is constantly associated with the discussion over feminism, but it isn’t always good. There is a huge conversation going on about if Beyoncé is or is not a feminist. I had always known there was discussion about Beyoncé and feminism, but I never knew how deep it went and how important of an issue it is to understand. When my professor suggested this topic, I was interested but not 100% sold on it, but when I started to look deeper into it, I knew it was both interesting and very important. If Beyoncé has a hand in the influence of feminism, she should be promoting a good image.
I'm interested in looking at a couple questions. Is Beyoncé a feminist? Does the way she uses her body support feminism or not? Should she be responsible for teaching her fans about feminism because she is so influential? How does she send mixed messages? Should she really even be involved in this debate without studying the history of feminism?
