By Talia Pantaleo

Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl LIX Performance

The Super Bowl, America’s most-watched television event, has evolved into a powerful platform for cultural expression. Beyond the game, its halftime shows and commercials often reflect and influence societal conversations, establishing it as a significant stage for artists, brands, players, and influencers to make impactful statements.

This year, Kendrick Lamar took center stage at Super Bowl LIX and used his halftime performance to deliver a powerful message about race, history, and the current state of political discourse in America.

The Significance of the Stage

Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime performance reached roughly 133.5 million viewers, making it the most-watched on record. With such a large audience spanning diverse demographics, the event provides an unparalleled platform for cultural expression and influence.

Football holds deep cultural significance in the United States and, as the pinnacle of the sport, the Super Bowl is bigger than the game itself. It serves as a unifying national event and one of the most distinctly American stages, where any statement is particularly impactful. This year’s game was notably attended by President Donald Trump, the first sitting president to attend the Super Bowl, which amplified the weight and importance of the stage.

Additionally, the location of the Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans offered a backdrop with deep ties to Black history and the African diaspora. Known for its unique blend of cultural contributions—from music to cuisine, New Orleans stands as a testament to Black resilience and art reflective of its heritage.

Political Undertones in Past Super Bowl Performances

Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime performance was not the first to incorporate political themes and messaging, which has become more prevalent in recent years.

In 2016, Beyoncé’s performance of Formation paid homage to Black empowerment and Southern Black culture, touching on issues such as Hurricane Katrina, which largely displaced Black Americans, and police violence.

In 2020, Jennifer Lopez & Shakira’s Super Bowl LIV show celebrated Latin culture while making a powerful statement on immigration. Lopez’s cape featured the Puerto Rican and American flags and showed children in cage-like structures in reference to the U.S.-Mexico border crisis.

In the 2022 Super Bowl halftime show with Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, and 50 Cent, Eminem’s decision to kneel in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick was widely interpreted as a protest against police brutality. The performance also marked the first halftime show to center hip-hop, a genre that has long faced industry and societal pushback.

The Performance

Lamar’s performance featured a blend of visual storytelling and lyrical depth, reinforcing themes of racial justice, censorship, and political unrest. As a recap of the politically-focused elements, we saw Samuel L. Jackson dressed as Uncle Sam, portraying an authority figure attempting to regulate Lamar’s performance. This personification of criticism underscored a theme Lamar has long explored in his music—the monitoring, silencing, and manipulation of Black voices and rap music in America.

The performance was also packed with lyrical symbolism and references. Kendrick rapped “40 acres and a mule, this is bigger than the music,” a reference to Union General William T. Sherman’s Special Field Order No. 15, (which promised reparations to formerly enslaved African Americans after the Civil War), signifying larger societal concern about racial justice and reparations. Lamar also said, “The Revolution’s About to be Televised” a reference to Gil Scott-Heron’s 1971 poem The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, critiquing media coverage of social change.

For physical symbolism, Kenrick’s dancers dressed in red, white, and blue, and stood in a formation to form an American flag. Kendrick then moved to the middle, splitting the center of the flag, symbolizing racial and political divisions in the United States today.

The stage design was also symbolic, with interpretations recognizing that the set resembled a prison yard, critiquing the mass incarceration system and its disproportionate impact on Black men. Additionally, a PlayStation controller appeared throughout the performance representing both the game of football and the broader “game” of political ideas and censorship. Samuel L. Jackson’s exclamation, “This is the great American game!” served as a layered commentary on the intersection of sports and politics.

Why It Matters

In an Apple Music interview prior to the Super Bowl, Lamar explained his artistic approach, “My initial process is, how can I open them up to the story? I just want you to feel it. The writing is there, now it’s up to me to perform it so you feel it … I like to carry on that sense of making people listen, but also see and think a little.”

His halftime show exemplified this philosophy, using the stage to provoke thought, bringing to light crucial conversations in the United States today.

Entertainment media has long played a crucial role in shaping political attitudes. When an artist of Lamar’s stature utilizes a platform as prominent as the Super Bowl to deliver a message, it not only elevates the discourse but also reshapes how political narratives reach the public. The performance exemplifies the evolving intersection of sports, entertainment, and activism—illustrating that political engagement can take many forms, even in once unexpected spaces.

By leveraging his artistry at the height of mainstream visibility, Lamar demonstrated how cultural expression can challenge, inform, and inspire audiences far beyond the stadium.