Equality can have many interpretations to different groups of people. Some may endorse equality while others may fight against equality. It’s an eternal warfare we humans can’t seem to resolve. In reality, we are fighting our own kind due to our difference as change may seem to be viciously terrifying to people who lose out to what the change is about. And the fear change brings out, traps those affected by it in a murky bubble. So the change in our case at this moment is regarding the state of African Americans in America at this point in time. African Americans had a pretty tough history behind them as they were originally slaves and were engulfed by racist remarks from the other parties involved. Nowadays this problem still persists as African Americans are being treated harshly by the police force in our country and one of the greatest issues America is facing today. It is an issue which is creating an uprising of people all around this country and many celebrities are endorsing this uprising in their work to create a message to the entire audiences. Beyoncé as one of the most popular singers in the modern era, with her video ‘formation’ uses this concept to create a grand statement that gives the audience awareness of everything going on in the world around them. Now I’m going to talk about how she achieves how she takes meaning out of every action in her main scenes in this video and on how she achieves those meaning.

Firstly, she prints out figurative bold statement onto the audience by stating the consequences of the main problem Americans are facing at this point of time where African Americans are being treated unfairly by the police force in this country. This motif is represented by the first scene of this music video where Beyoncé is standing on top of a police car which is slowly descending into the flooded waters of New Orleans after the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. This scene resonates between other scenes at (0:05, 0:24, 0:57, 2:57, 3:16, 3:27,4:06, 4:25, 4:36, 4:41) as it is the main point she is trying to portray this entire video.

While many with my myself included interpret this scene as a symbol of empowerment where Beyoncé is showing that she is in total control by standing on top of the police car and the police car sinking into the flooded waters of New Orleans represents the fact that the whole country is sliding back into past oppression. Others may disagree with this concept and interpret this scene as an over exaggeration of the current situation in America stating that America is perfect the way it exactly is but in reality, there are shootings in this country regularly and it affects African Americans more so than the others. The background music varies differently for this scene throughout the video but at (0:21) it can be seen that the feeling of tension is in the air as Beyoncé is giving us a message that she shares the interpretation of something that right in our country. Her statement of what the initial problem is and the way it creates a sense of tension among the viewers is resolved in a later scene within this video.

It can be said that the young African American boy who started dancing in front of a legion of police officers and coming to resolution where the young boy raises his hands up followed by the legion of police officer raising their hands up (3:45, 4:04, 4:21) is the resolution of the main theme Beyoncé was trying to portray in her scene discussed in paragraph 2 and in turn the resolution of the whole music video. This scene in point of view signifies a sense of resolution to the motives of the sinking police car from the second paragraph meaning that even through the reckless actions of the police force in the African American community, the African American community will not sit still and that they will keep fighting on till everyone is on the same page.

I presume Beyonce makes this meaning of her resolution practical in his scene as I say that the young African American boy represents the African American community where he dances in front of the police officers as a form of protest and later raising his hands up followed by the police officers raising their hands up as symbol that African American community will not stop fighting for equality until everyone is on the same page. This interpretation of this scene was also amplified by the background music which was played when the boy came into this scene with lyrics ‘I go hard’ of the song which in part shows up the resilient feature of my interpretation. There may also be people who think that the country is perfect the way it actually is as discussed in paragraph 3 and that Beyonce is creating an over exaggerating effect in this music video just to build her level of fame but in reality those selfish claims won’t change the way in which this scene should be interpreted.

There is no doubt that this music video is a work of art, beautiful art. Beyoncé indeed makes a bold statement which shows that work needs to be done to resolve this matter of violence towards the African-American community. She addresses the fact that our society is in a downward spiral by portraying it in the form of the sinking police car and that the society is an act of resurgence by fighting back in the form of the young boy dancing. Hopefully, her reasoning of change needs to occur will reach out to people who are terrified by it, to embrace change so everyone can be on the same page. The pursuit of equality is exponentially growing and through works of art by Beyonce and many other big household names, change and equality will be inevitable.