Kendrick Lamar's Message to America
Author: Jalysa Combs
1 additions to document , most recent 10 months ago
| When | Why |
|---|---|
| Feb-11-25 | Video |
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This photo comes from the article 'What Was Kendrick Lamar's Symbolic Message During Super Bowl Halftime Show?'
Article: https://www.newsweek.com/kendrick-lamar-symbolic-message-super-bowl-halftime-show-2028856
This year at the 2025 Super Bowl was a moment to remember. So many great things happened especially the Eagles winning! Fly Eagles Fly. But the most monumental moment I thought of was Kendrick Lamar's performance during the halftime show. He wasn't just a performance but it was a message to America. What made this so much more powerful was that President Trump was attending. So not only was it a message to America but a message to the President of America. There was so much historical and political symbolism.
The first most noticeable symbolism of the Super Bowl was of Samuel L. Jackson dressed up as Uncle Sam. Uncle Sam is one of the most well-known symbols that represent America. Uncle Sam depicts the federal government of our country. During Samuel’s commentary, he states the music as being too loud and ghetto, as a way of “sanitizing America”. To make America look a certain way so we can seem like “one of the best countries in the world”. Or at least that’s what I get from that. This can be seen as America suppressing people’s voices. The voices of people who need to be heard, for example, people of color.
Another thing that I found interesting was a detail pointed out by someone on social media through Instagram. When all of the dancers suddenly drop to the floor, there are some still standing. The ones still standing form a circle all facing each other. This detail is very slick and can easily be missed if you're not paying attention. A conclusion that a lot of people draw from this is those still standing in the circle will live. They weren’t touched or hurt because they were in the inner circle. A circle that I see as a power move because of the power they normally hold inside of the circle. They usually know more stuff than others which people can argue puts them at an advantage.
While that represents America, the clothing colors the dancers were wearing represent the American flag. Something many may not have spotted was the dancers all coming out of a clown car. As they come out of the clown car together, they all become separated based on their colors. The message says as if though we all come from the same place, we will always be separated. The Reds together, blues together, and whites together which can be broken down into the understanding of race as well as the political divisions in this country. They mainly stay that way until they come together to form the American Flag. As when we come together we represent our country because we are all Americans.
To end this off I want to mention something that wasn’t shown on TV during the halftime performance. There was a performer holding up a Palestinian and Sudanese flag to support Gaza and Sudanese. If you search through the internet, there are videos of this person waving the flag around while dancing with the other dancers. It is reported that no one else knew he was going to do this so this may have been a stunt on his own. He was eventually detained and taken away from the performance where he later got arrested. He thankfully does not have charges against him but he is banned from all NFL events in the future. I find it weird how we didn’t see this on TV. It was as if it was trying to suppress the message that people in Palestine and Sudan need our help.
Added February 11, 2025 at 7:43pm
by Jalysa Combs
Title: Video
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