On June 19th, also known as the holiday Junteenth, Beyoncé dropped BLACK PARADE, her newest song that vividly talks about black pride and the importance of black heritage and culture. After listening to the song once, I couldn’t think of a better day to drop the song than Junteenth as the topic fits hand-to-hand with the day of celebration. The Beyhive, as she likes to call her fanbase, couldn’t hold in their excitement as Beyoncé sings about her hometown, African roots, and hints of her womanhood in her new song. Throughout the song, she uses words such as “Baobab” which is a sub-saharan tree in Africa. A line after that, she sings “Ankh charm on gold chains, with my Oshun energy, oh. Drip all on me, woo, Ankh or the Dashiki print” which contain words that are unfamiliar to those that don’t know much about Africa. Ankh refers to an ancient symbol from Egypt, Oshun is one of the Orisha goddesses from Nigeria, and Dashiki refers to a colorful African shirt. While rhyming and flowing, she puts together words that can be linked back to African culture which is creative- she could’ve just said the word “tree” instead of the specific tree of Baobab or taken the words “Ankh” and “Oshun” out of the sentence, but she decided to use them to make her audience want to look up what those words mean and why they’re important to the African culture. This effort shows her emotions and how she feels about her true roots from Africa. All around the song, from the chorus to different verses, items that lead to the African culture can be found hidden within sentences- this is important because there aren’t that many songs out there today sung by A-list celebrities that mention anything from the African culture. For Beyoncé to be singing about her womanhood and her roots from Africa is inspirational to many that are from Africa and that don’t have a favorite singer that represents their home country and origin. Many are thankful and happy that Beyoncé has, yet again, blown the minds of many by combining current social issues, national issues, and worldwide issues- such as COVID-19, police brutality protests, and woman’s rights’ movements- into a catchy song that speaks “a thousand words” in just a couple of minutes.
On June 19th, also known as the holiday Junteenth, Beyoncé dropped BLACK PARADE, her newest song that vividly talks about black pride and the importance of black heritage and culture. After listening to the song once, I couldn’t think of a better day to drop the song than Junteenth as the topic fits hand-to-hand with the day of celebration. The Beyhive, as she likes to call her fanbase, couldn’t hold in their excitement as Beyoncé sings about her hometown, African roots, and hints of her womanhood in her new song. Throughout the song, she uses words such as “Baobab” which is a sub-saharan tree in Africa. A line after that, she sings “Ankh charm on gold chains, with my Oshun energy, oh. Drip all on me, woo, Ankh or the Dashiki print” which contain words that are unfamiliar to those that don’t know much about Africa. Ankh refers to an ancient symbol from Egypt, Oshun is one of the Orisha goddesses from Nigeria, and Dashiki refers to a colorful African shirt. While rhyming and flowing, she puts together words that can be linked back to African culture which is creative- she could’ve just said the word “tree” instead of the specific tree of Baobab or taken the words “Ankh” and “Oshun” out of the sentence, but she decided to use them to make her audience want to look up what those words mean and why they’re important to the African culture. This effort shows her emotions and how she feels about her true roots from Africa. All around the song, from the chorus to different verses, items that lead to the African culture can be found hidden within sentences- this is important because there aren’t that many songs out there today sung by A-list celebrities that mention anything from the African culture. For Beyoncé to be singing about her womanhood and her roots from Africa is inspirational to many that are from Africa and that don’t have a favorite singer that represents their home country and origin. Many are thankful and happy that Beyoncé has, yet again, blown the minds of many by combining current social issues, national issues, and worldwide issues- such as COVID-19, police brutality protests, and woman’s rights’ movements- into a catchy song that speaks “a thousand words” in just a couple of minutes.