The song "Pretty Hurts" by Beyoncé discusses society's unrealistic beauty standards and their negative effect on women's body image. The music video depicts Beyoncé competing in a beauty pageant, showing the lengths women go to conform to narrow beauty ideals, like using diet pills and cosmetic procedures. Through the video, Beyoncé aims to empower women by rejecting society's definition of beauty and finding self-worth beyond physical appearance.

1. Beyoncé – Pretty Hurts
Textual Analysis

2. Language
• “Pretty Hurts" is a self-empowerment pop song
discussing society beauty standards and analyzing
female body image. Beyoncé decided to record it
to show the negative effect of beauty pageants
and expectations on how women should look.
The theme of "Pretty Hurts" is related to third-wave
feminism; it is intended as a self-empowerment
anthem for women as Beyoncé
sings negatively of beauty stereotypes and
expectations on how women should look which
are often "impossible" and created mostly by the
society.

3. …
• The song opens with an audio snippet of a beauty pageant
judge asking Beyoncé, "Miss 3rd Ward... What is your
aspiration in life?" to which she replies "My aspiration in
life would be... to be happy." The seven-minute long video
depicts Beyoncé playing a beauty queen who
represents Third Ward, the area of Houston in which she
grew up It opens with a sound of a poignant piano and
shots of Beyoncé with short hair looking at herself in the
mirror with her face covered in make-up. It then transitions
to high angle shots of female contestants preparing for a
beauty pageant backstage, combing their hair, fitting their
dresses and analyzing their bodies. Which connotes to
them being superior to Beyoncé.

4. …
• A host announces Beyoncé as "Miss 3rd Ward" and she
appears on stage, smiling and singing the first verse of the
song a capella. This shot is a lot longer in comparison, this
could have been used to emphasise her realisation of how
beauty pageants are wrong. An applause follows from the
crowd as the judges take notes about her. The music starts
and Beyoncé is seen during the preparations for the show.
The scene transitions to a judge, played by the fashion
model Shaun Ross, working with the models during which
Beyoncé is seen taking diet pills He measures her abdomen
with a tape and hits her thighs showing her how she should
behave when she appears on the stage. The second verse
follows during which she is seen exercising at home and
measuring her weight appearing unsatisfied.

5. …
• We then see the host call Beyoncé on the stage and praises her for
her performance at the competition asking the crowd to applaud to
the "beautiful and poised" ladies in the competition. He then asks,
"Miss 3rd Ward, your first question. What is your aspiration in life?"
the line which is also heard during the beginning on the album
version. She replies, "Oh, my aspiration in life? That's a great
question. I wasn't expecting that question" as her voice repeating
the question is echoed and the scene then cuts to her drowning in
water, symbolising the pressure of looking a certain way and
looking unhappy with the beauty pageant culture. After that, she
answers, "My aspiration in life would be to be happy". The chorus
starts again and Beyoncé is seen destroying all the trophies she had
previously won, further emphasizing their meaningless.

6. …
• During the bridge of the song, the pageant contestant
is seen at a hospital with a plastic surgeon
injecting botox in the previously drawn lines on her
face. During that scene Beyoncé is wearing a
white straight jacket to represent that she is trapped by
society's beauty standards. At the end of the video,
Beyoncé loses the competition to an albino woman
after which she happily congratulates her. The last
scene shows her looking happy and smiling with little
make-up on her face. The last thirty seconds of the
video transition to a footage of Beyoncé as a child
winning an award for Female Pop Vocalist on a
television show.

7. Ideology
• The man ideology that is presented in the music video is self-empowerment
and self-worth. The video emphasizes society’s
beauty standards and over analyzing the female body.
• In the video we see the lengths these woman go to to conform to
what society sees as ‘perfect’, e.g taking diet pulls, pulling at their
skin, making themselves sick, cosmetic surgery, spray tans, choosing
outfits, doing hair and make up.
• The music video is very real and relates to the target audience
directly. The lyrics also work with the mise-en-scene and contribute
to the representation.
• For example, the lyrics ‘perfection is a disease of a nation’, ‘ain’t no
doctor or pill that can take the pain away’. All these lyrics represent
a powerful message about how society’s pressure to look ‘perfect’
can make people feel.

8. Institution
• Beyonce is signed to Columbia Records a conglomerate of
Sony Music. Beyonce’s latest self titled was released at
midnight on December 12th 2014. Despite not marketing
the album or mentioning it, it went straight to number 1 in
many different countries and even caused twitter to break.
• “Pretty Hurts” is from a her fifth (latest) studio album. The
song is about self-empowerment and discusses beauty
stands and analyzing female body image. Beyonce decided
to record it to show the negative effect of beauty pageants
and expectations that women have to be ‘perfect’.
• Upon it’s release it received positive reviews from music
critics who commended the lyrics and Beyonce’s vocal
performance.

9. Audience
• Due to the message of self-empowerment and self-worth this song
will appeal to mass audience. However, I believe it was appeal in
particularly to her young female teenage fans. This is due to the fact
that they are surrounded by these images of how they are
supposed to look and might more passive and consume them,
rather than the reject them as this song suggests.
• This song may also appeal to a male audience as it captures women
in revealing outfits (Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze).
• Beyonce is trying to give the impression that society (and her
audience) should stop objectifying each other so much and that
beauty shouldn’t be a competition.
• Beyonce also led a campaign on social media called ‘#WhatIsPretty’,
which she asked fans to post pictures of what they thought was
beautiful using the hashtag. The pictures would then be on
whatispretty.com for 4 weeks.

10. Representation
• In the music video Beyoncé is playing beauty pageant
character persona. However, I believe that she her
based the character on herself and perhaps her own
insecurities.
• She is a representative as a woman who is struggling
with her body image and the pressure from society.
Due to the fact we see her struggle, it makes the
audience believe that even pop stars such as Beyoncé
also feel the pressure from society.
• The other characters in the video also represented in
the same way giving the video verisimilitude.