The Social and Political Significance of Beyoncé’s ‘Lemonade’

FEATURING CHAÉDRIA LABOUVIER – The pop megastar Beyoncé surprised her fans last week by releasing an album called Lemonade. She spearheaded a massive collaboration of artists that includes the award winning Kenyan-Somali poet Warsan Shire, the unabashedly political hip hop artist Kendrick Lamar, the tennis superstar and role model Serena Williams, Jack White from The White Stripes, and Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant.

But, continuing her trajectory toward embracing a more socially conscious approach to music and artistry, Queen Bey also sampled a Malcolm X speech and showcased the mothers of black men killed by police. Central to the critical acclaim her work is garnering is the sense that Lemonade is “unapologetically black.” The overwhelming majority of people featured in the visual one-hour version of the album are black women.

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Chaédria LaBouvier, writer for Elle Magazine.