From 2015 to 2019: The Meaning of “Like A Girl”

Most people by now are familiar with Lizzo, the new feminist icon soaring across music’s top charts. While her songs are upbeat and provide catchy instrumental elements that appeal to all, Lizzo has become much more than just a pop artist. Her new album, Cuz I love you, features songs all centered around girl power. Almost perfectly, one of her most popular songs is even titled “Like A Girl”, the same exact phrase Always used in their campaign surrounded the commercial I have chosen for my speech.

Lizzo, born Melissa Jefferson, is a 31 year old rapper, singer, songwriter, actress, classically trained flutist, and activist. Born in Detroit, Michigan, Lizzo around the country before landing in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she began seriously pursuing her musical career. Though she has been recording and releasing music in various groups and under various labels since 2012, she quickly rose to popularity in roughly the past year, with her single “Truth Hurts” even becoming a Penn State Football game staple.

What’s especially interesting when comparing “Like A girl”, the song by Lizzo, versus “Like A Girl”, the campaign launched by Always, is that they bring to light the same phrase, but in completely different ways. While the Always commercial was focusing on engaging the audience more by providing the negative connotation surrounding the phrase “Like A Girl”, Lizzo’s song is entirely about the power women have and the fact the doing something “like a girl” means absolutely crushing the task. Even more interesting is the fact that the commercial was aired four years before Lizzo released her song, showing that in the past four years the Always campaign’s goal of changing the phrase “like a girl” from an insult to a compliment has been accomplished, whether by the campaign itself or not.

I am particularly drawn to using Lizzo’s song “Like A Girl” as my essay artifact because of the personal effect Lizzo’s music has had on my life. Since around May, my friends at home and I listened exclusively to Lizzo, especially when we were experiencing some kind of boy-related drama. I am very excited to compare these two artifacts in my essay, because not only do they exhibit many parallels though they are completely different media types, but because it’s exciting to see how far the “girl power” movement has come in four short years. One particular aspect I am excited to delve into is the portion of the commercial in which the girls discuss the gravity of being told they do something “like a girl” while going through puberty. This catches my attention because now that a role model like Lizzo has emerged, perhaps the girls going through this stage of their life won’t deal with such degrading insults, and instead absorb the confidence Lizzo spreads through her music.