People often subconsciously pass over the visual symbols while watching a film or video. There is deeper meaning behind the different aspects of the film that get disregarded by people just by mindlessly watching. For example, people may like listening to Beyonce or watching her music videos but do not really pay attention to the deeper meaning behind everything. Her recent music video for her song “Formation” speaks about issues in everyday society on many different levels. She takes her stance on the oppression of groups of people such as the injustice against African-Americans and the changed image of women these days. She uses herself as a visual motif to represent these lingering issues relating to race and gender. 

The first frame that immediately stands out as a symbol of the oppressin of her race is the one of Beyonce standing on top of a police car that is sinking in the flood. The police car sinking is a major symbol and sort of speaks for itself. Beyonce is on top of the police car and in this instance she represents the African-American community as a whole. The black community feels oppressed by the police force and this shows their ultimate goal. The camera focuses in on Beyonce and the police car both with the lighting and picture quality. The background is dull and other than the town being in shambles, everything seems to be calm. The contrasting colors of the blue police car and the red outfit of Beyonce shows the conflict between the two groups. The lyrics also show her stance when she says she “earned all this money but they never take the country out me”. Even though Beyonce does not directly relate to these problems due to her fame and fortune, she still stands by her people and her culture.

Beyonce also uses the lyrics and self-images in this video to express her feelings about women in society. She shows that men no longer dominate society and that women can be independently successful. She shows this through a couple of frames throughout the video. The first frame being the one where she is standing in front of five men showing off her middle fingers. She is wearing an excessive amount of fancy jewelry to show off her wealth and class. The men in the back are supposed to represent her butlers or servants. Beyonce flips the script of the old days and is saying that women can possess more power these days. She is directly addressing gender inequality. The lyrics in this portion are explicit but in short they state that she has control over her man. When he does what she wants and is able to please her, she rewards him with her wealth, which again used to be the other way around. 

Beyonce takes extreme pride in her race and really emphasizes the point of the African American community rising up as a whole. Once again she takes this stance with her lyrics. Beyonce talks about her love for the appearance of African Americans. She states, “I like my baby hair, with baby hair and afros. I like my negro nose with Jackson Five nostrils.” This is yet another example of Beyonce endorsing her race to everyone. She uses her own appearance as well as a generalized African American baby to show what she believes are the beauties of the African American race. 

Later in the video Beyonce touches on what has been a huge problem in the last few years. Beyonce pictures a hooded black boy dancing in the street with a whole squad of police watching. The boy then stops dancing and puts up his hands, which prompts the officers to put up their hands with him. She portrays what she would like the relationship to be between the police force and her race. The young boy and the police show the desired peace. This scene is directly aimed at the Black Lives Matter movement. The situation between the two sides is exactly what sparks the whole racial inequality debate. Beyonce is once again using her fame to publicly address these issues. She has more power than the traditional human because she can release a song such as this one for millions of people to see. She is using herself to advertise and voice the African American view on the current state of the United States. 

Beyonce continues to use herself as a visual motif late in the video as well. She does this by essentially showing herself as an idol for her culture to follow. This is shown by the image of her once again standing on the police car, but this time she is standing and her arms are out to her sides as if she is forming a cross. This shows herself as somewhat of a Christ figure for her culture. The camera angle makes it look like she is walking on water; something that only Christ would be able to do. She is taking the lead for equality for all groups of people. Beyonce uses her high standing in pop culture to get her message across. She utilizes her fame and fortune to make the attempt at getting people to join her in her movement. In each example Beyonce as a human keeps popping up as the driving force behind each visual symbol presented. In the end this should make sense because it is in fact her song. 