Chimamanda Adichie Features On “Flawless” in BEYONCÉ

Beyonce & Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - December 2013 - BellaNaija

Let’s file this under – “while you were sleeping”.

Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter aka Queen Bey amongst her stans, released a self-titled “visual album”, the 5th in her solo career, Friday December 13, 2013 exclusively sold on iTunes.

Nigeria’s very own – esteemed author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie features on track 11, called Flawless, that starts with a snippet of track Bow Down, before transitioning into a rousing feminist speech by the author, then the new song.

For the video treatment, the author didn’t make an appearance.

Chimamanda says,

“We teach girls to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller

We say to girls – you can have ambition, but not too much

You should aim to be successful but not too successful otherwise you will threaten the man

Because I am female I am expected to aspire to marriage

I am expected to make my life choices always keeping in mind that marriage is the most important

A marriage can be a source of joy and love and mutual support

But why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage and we don’t teach boys the same?

We raise girls to see each other as competitors not for jobs or for accomplishments,

Which I think can be a good thing

But for the attention of men

We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings in the way that boys are

Feminist: A person who believes in the economic, social and political equality of the sexes.”