The Difference in the Same Action
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THE DIFFERENCE IN THE SAME ACTION The substantiality of black feminism versus white feminism, as illustrated by Beyoncé’s appropriation of Pipilotti Rist’s Ever is Over All (1997) By Rosanne Jonkhout 2 Introduction: Celebrities are increasingly using their platform to address particular social issues. Take the last two years alone: We have witnessed quarterback Colin Kaepernick taking a knee during the American national anthem in protest of police brutality.1 Kim Kardashian wrote an essay on the sexual objectification of women’s bodies.2 Singer Frank Ocean questions gender stereotypes with album Blonde (2016).3 Kendrick Lamar released a sophisticated album To Pimp A Butterfly (2015) targeting the interrelations of cultural and institutional racism.4 There are many more examples but the much anticipated, recent visual album Lemonade (2016) by musician Beyoncé caused its own kind of stir. The scene accompanying the song Hold Up is strikingly similar to a video-installation by Pipilotti Rist called Ever is Over All (1997). The connection between these two scenes has been made before, but both the connection and the meaning behind it have not been studied. Its research might prove relevant since Beyoncé is a representant of the gender politics of black feminism in media studies. Ever is Over All is famous in its feminist symbolism and with Lemonade frequently been described as a ‘love letter to black women’,5 this research will therefore focus on feminist theory, specifically intersectional feminism. The term feminism will be approached with regard to the definition by Oxford Handbook Online which defines feminism as ‘a rejection of the ideology of patriarchy’,6 in all its forms: it recognizes injustices from legal- institutional sexism to the most subtle, microcultural forms of sexism which applies seamlessly to Beyoncé’s case for its intersectionality. This essay will be researched by approaching it through discourse analysis of media studies theory on Rist and Beyoncé’s feminist semiotics. The goal of this research is to shed new light on the meaning of Beyoncé’s political shift in career and its position in the third-wave feminist branch of intersectionality. This will be attempted by studying Lemonade and offsetting it with Ever is Over All throughout the text. First, it will delve into feminist discourse contemporary to the release dates of the works. Hereafter, it will proceed to analyse and compare both works and proceed to research Ever is Over All as to lay groundwork on which to build Beyoncé’s case as contrast. 1 Wagoner, Nick. "Kaepernick Kneels to Continue Anthem Protest." ESPN.com. N.p., 2 Sept. 2016. Web. 15 Dec. 2016. 2 West, Kim Kardashian. "Happy International Women's Day - Kim." KimKardashianWest.com. N.p., 08 Mar. 2016. Web. 15 Dec. 2016. Original source now requires access fee, full essay available at: http://metro.co.uk/2016/03/09/everyone-should-read-kim-kardashians-essay-on-slut-shaming-5741455/ 3 Caramanica, Jon. "Frank Ocean Ends His Long Silence with a Variety of Works." The New York Times. The New York Times, 22 Aug. 2016. Web. 15 Dec. 2016. 4 […] I'm trapped inside the ghetto and I ain't proud to admit it. Institutionalized; I could still kill me a nigga, so what? If I was the president, I'd pay my mama's rent. Free my homies and them. Bulletproof my Chevy doors. Lay in the White House and get high, Lord. Who ever thought? Master, take the chains off me! […]. Lamar, Kendrick, Bilal, Anna Wise, and Snoop Dogg. By K. Duckworth, Kendrick Lamar, Sam Barsh, Columbus Smith, Frederik Halldin, and Itzik Bensoli. Institutionalized. Kendrick Lamar. Itzik Bensoli, 2015. MP3. 5 ‘Lemonade Beyoncé 'love Letter Black Women’' - Google Search. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Nov. 2016. 6 Chambers, Clare, and Michael Freeden. "Oxford Handbooks Online: Feminism." Oxfordhandbooks.com. Ed. Marc Stears. Oxford University Press, 13 Apr. 2015. Web. 24 Sept. 2016. p.1 3 Brief history of feminism: Feminism is said to come in ‘waves’. The wave-terminology when regarding to feminism was coined in the New York Times Magazine by Martha Lear in 1968.7 The emergence of female emancipation in the late 19th century and early 20th century regarded mainly women’s legal inequalities to men, such as the right to vote (suffrage), this is referred to as the first wave. The second wave, as feminism in the years 1960’s through 1980’s is also described, broadened the discussion, which then additionally evolved to injustices around social inequalities, for example around the workplace, family, reproductive rights, etc. What is being called the Third wave of feminism is usually determined to start around 1990’s.8 This branch of feminism differs from the other in several ways where feminism’s ‘second wave’ endured a lot of criticism. It was claimed by many to be too one-sided; namely representing ideas applicable on mainly young, white, able-bodied upper-class women. The third wave made way for much more heterogeneous ideas on feminism, such as intersectionality. The term intersectionality was coined by Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, American civil rights advocate and leading scholar of critical race theory in 1989,9 but it took a while before it was included as part of the third-wave. Intersectionality is the idea that identities are made up of different interrelated aspects. Feminism is no longer a uniformity that only applies to one identity; race, sexuality, class, etc, are all facets that tie an identity together. This is studied so that injustices are to be understood and fought multidimensional level. Comparative object analysis of Ever is Over All and Hold Up from Lemonade: At first sight the similarities of Ever is Over All and the distinct scene Lemonade that joints with the song Hold Up, appear extremely clear. In the image placed on the title page of this text, both women can be seen smashing the passenger window of a car. Not only the act of smashing the window is similar. They are on the same side of the street, their stances match. The position of the cameras is the same: the camera positioned in front, while walking with/ahead of her. Still it doesn’t stop there, even the method of filming is the same; both women are walking along the street in slow-motion, accompanied by music. They both seem to have a sense of glee while destroying their surroundings. Dissimilarities are harder to find. Rist attacks vehicles with a giant flower as opposed to the baseball bat dubbed “Hot Sauce” Beyoncé uses. Another difference is that bystanders in Rist’s video do not seem to care about the vandalism; a passing-by female police officer even greets Rist in friendly support. They seem to either not be aware of the act or choose to ignore it. Beyoncé’s witnesses display a slightly more realistic reaction as they experience an exuberant kind of shock. Beyoncé herself has a wilder, angry kind of expression of exhilaration on her face whereas Rist is trying to keep it as light-hearted and giggly as possible. 7 Lear, Martha. "The Second Feminist Wave." The New York Times Magazine. 10 Mar. 1968: n. pag. Print. 8 Tong, Rosemarie. Feminist Thought: A More Comprehensive Introduction. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1998. Print. p. 284–285, 289. 9 Crenshaw, Kimberle. "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics." The University of Chicago Legal Forum 140 (1989): 139-67. PhilPapers.org. PhilPapers, 01 Sept. 2013. Web. 16 Dec. 2016. 4 The soundtrack to the scenes are also inherently different. Ever is Over All features a slow, dazed humming of a woman’s voice. Lemonade features an R&B song. Since Beyoncé foremost occupation is considered to be musician and the album is available for purchasing a traditional CD with just the twelve songs, even if the film is considered inseparable in its significance, it is logical to deduct that Lemonade is indented for the music industry. Ever is Over All on the other hand, is intended as artwork. It therefore has a different target audience. Because of this difference in discipline, in Ever is Over All’s case it might therefore be said that its soundtrack is in service of the video, whereas with Lemonade the soundtrack has at least the same, if not more weight than the film. Beyoncé choosing to repeat the same action or appropriating this work of Pipilotti Rist 19 years later is an intriguing one. However much the two scenes have in common, they both tell a completely different story. What has happened in feminist discourse in that 19 years and what is the message Beyoncé transmits by repeating this action? What do these women have to say with their actions? How do they relate or do they even relate? Feminist discourse analysis of the work Ever is Over All by Pipilotti Rist: Pipilotti Rist’s work Ever is Over All features herself as protagonist. She is seen walking down the street, dressed in a flowy blue dress, holding a flower made of iron. With this flower she smashes windows of the cars parked along the pavement. In the version of the work purchased by MoMa, the projection dissolves into another projection on its right-hand side. It combines the images of the street with one of a field of flowers, similar to the one Rist holds in her hands.10 The video of Rist in streets seems to circulate on its own as well, without the video of the field of flowers. Whether this might be a later or earlier version of the work is not sure.11 Pipilotti Rist began making video art in the 1980’s, when post-punk era was at its prime.