Womanly Work as an Integral Structure: Weaving Together Society

We quickly learn that the loom in Sassafrass, Cypress & Indigo is of particular importance. Each daughter possesses something that early on acts to signal to the reader the divergent paths they are to take. For Cypress this is dance, for Indigo her dolls that act as her link to a different world, and for…

“Power play in the gaze”: The role of position in establishing power structure in Beyoncé’s “Formation”

As she coasts past in the scene from 1:00 to 1:06, Beyoncé retains eye contact with the camera; her cool, deliberate gaze reeks of confidence and poise. This attitude seems at first to echo the shift in tempo of the song, the blank absence of the repetitive, almost claxon-like beat that has dominated the listener’s…