Black Secret Technology: Beyonce’s Formation

Beyonce and the secret society

Beyonce and the secret society

Trayvon Martin’s (Sandra Bland’s) birthday, Mardi Gras, Black History Month, Black Panthers’ 50th/Super Bowl’s 50th. Beyonce’s release for her latest song and music video, Formation, was strategically dropped today. Already, bloggers and critics are analyzing the video, so here I am taking notes, comparing/contrasting the drum and bass in A Guy Called Gerald’s Black Secret Technology (1995) with the trap music in Formation. Basically, trap is rap plus dubstep and both of these genres can easily be mixed with drum and bass.

Formation reveals an evolving black techno-vernacular.

But despite its hybrid roots, techno is specifically an African American variation on the themes of inner-city collapse… – Ben Williams, Black Secret Technology

Formation honors the Black South, which has African roots.

Formation is a great way to educate folks about black history, especially the notion of a radical blackness that perseveres in spite of it all. So many people are unaware of the migratory histories that followed them to where they are, of the ways in which African symbols and rituals were secretly embedded in the American cultural fabric. Formation is post-Katrina New Orleans as techno was post-industrial Detroit. Similar themes emerge: African diasporic traditions, electronic music and the Kalunga line, a watery boundary between the world of the living and the dead in religious traditions of the Congo. The word Kalunga is Kikongo for “threshold between worlds.” It is often associated with bodies of water, with the Atlantic Ocean being prominent.

Three Gedes

Fet Ghede (Feast of the Ancestors): Three Ghedes

chief

A West African king featured prominently

Beyonce in a post-Katrina New Orleans

Beyonce in a post-Katrina New Orleans

My version of the Kongo Cosmogram.

My version of the Kongo Cosmogram

We are beautiful people
With African imaginations
full of masks and dances and swelling chants
with African eyes, and noses, and arms
tho we sprawl in gray chains in a place
full of winters, when what we want is sun. – Amiri Baraka

In Formation, Beyonce positions herself at the center of the African cosmogram, between the living and the dead. Trayvon Martin is the Ghede Nibo, a patron of those who died by unnatural causes (i.e., violence). He is the guardian of the graves of those who died prematurely. Also in the video is a man riding a horse that, according to myth, can give voice to the dead spirits whose bodies have not been reclaimed from “below the waters.” A young boy wearing a hoodie performs a defiant dance in front of a line of policemen as a tribute to the fallen. His dance is reminiscent of Storyboard P in Until the Quiet Comes.

The ghost dance

The ghost dance in “Formation”

Storyboard P in “Until the Quiet Comes”.

Storyboard P in “Until the Quiet Comes”

The Kalunga line is not the ocean itself; it is the horizon line that separates the land of the living from the land of the Ancestors. In Formation the living are the survivors. Children dance, women sit in their parlors and people go about their daily lives. In the “dirty” version of the song, Beyonce refers to lovemaking but the lyrics are not the focus of this post. However, sex (birth and rebirth) is on the side of the living as well as the dead.

The living: children (Blue Ivy, center)

The living: children (Blue Ivy, center)

The living: women in the parlor

The living: women in the parlor

mardigras

The living: Mardi Gras Indian performer

The visuals for “Formation” offer up New Orleans as convergence place for a blackness that slays through dreams, work, ownership, legacy, and the audacity of bodies that dare move and live in the face of death. – Zandria Robinson, We Slay, Pt. 1

Scholars such as Joseph Roach have noted that Mardi Gras Indian groups perform a rite of territory repossessed. One purpose of this practice, including the secret preparations and spectacular performances, is to “publicly imagine a space, a continent, from which the white man and his culture have vanished or retreated to the peripheries.” The significance of this repossessed territory or space in Formation shouldn’t be overlooked.

Formation celebrates radical blackness in everyday life.

Black girl audacity, boldness and confidence is just what is needed at a time when reports indicate that Black students get suspended and expelled at disproportionate rates in public and private schools, especially in the South. Beyonce puts her daughter front and center in the video to convey the need to foster these qualities in black youth, not push them down.

tumblr_o259n1rkvy1rnigreo2_540

Towards the end of the music video, Beyonce falls below the Kalunga line and is submerged in water with the police car she laid down on. I have seen this water submersion imagery before. I’ve seen it in Until the Quiet Comes and other videos such as Maxwell’s Embrya and in Drexciya’s sonic mythology and cover art.

water

Submersion in “Formation”

Maxwell's "Embrya,"; Drexciya's "Neptune's Lair," 1999, by Abdul Qadim Haqq; Khalil Joseph's "Until the Quiet Comes," 2012.

Maxwell’s “Embrya,”; Drexciya’s “Neptune’s Lair,” 1999, by Abdul Qadim Haqq; Khalil Joseph’s “Until the Quiet Comes,” 2012.

The idea of a secret technology recalls a time when certain African expressions were prohibited in the Americas (i.e., drumming). Symbols and rituals were hidden and embedded in art/crafts (ex. quilting), dance and rhythms, all of which formed the basis for black cultural production that eventually spread around the world. The African Cosmogram (cultural, spiritual and ritualistic map) is a technology that plays a key role in this development. Formation continues the progression of this technology that engages viewers through a lens of radical blackness: the video is unapologetically black.

Beyonce as sentry

Beyonce sits as a sentry: twirling

Support Black Futures

Support Black Futures

Juxtapositions: Women of the Black Power Movement in the 1970s; Beyonce and her dancers at the 50th Super Bowl

Juxtapositions: Women of the Black Power Movement in the 1970s; Beyonce and her dancers at the 50th Super Bowl

Formation puts a positive spin on what is going on in black communities across the U.S. It gives hope to a historically marginalized, oppressed people. When you see people dancing in the video it’s an act of celebration. This expression is key, as an act of defiance and survival in the face of adversity. Note the dance scenes that call forward Spike Lee’s Chiraq (2015). The video is culturally sustaining with Beyonce as our guide, navigating the past, present and pointing towards a future for black people.

  1. #1 by jazintellect on February 7, 2016 - 6:06 pm

    Reblogged this on The Afrosoul Chronicles and commented:
    Revolutionary Black Pop Culture… #BlackFutureMonth

  2. #2 by Nicole Coe on February 7, 2016 - 6:07 pm

    In race and gender course this is excellent.

  3. #3 by Regina N. Bradley on February 7, 2016 - 6:56 pm

    That dope work.

  4. #5 by ourobo on February 7, 2016 - 7:23 pm

    In the context of what you write, it’s also interesting to note the double meaning between “get in formation” and “get information”

  5. #7 by Roc on February 7, 2016 - 8:27 pm

    Reblogged this on My Truth Captured.

  6. #8 by asaliearthwork on February 7, 2016 - 11:49 pm

    As in the beginning, salt water once again takes everything. I love this.

  7. #9 by Jasira Monique on February 8, 2016 - 2:54 am

    There were so many wonderful points in this post, but I’m curious as to why the ever-present ‘Moors’ weren’t addressed, the tribute to Spike Lee’s ‘Chi-raq’ and the idea of ladies getting in formation to promote black feminist power among other things? I think this piece if analyzing those were done would have definitely landed in the case study files at the university level. There is so much power in what was written, so I salute the brilliance and pan-Africanism here.

    • #10 by nettrice on February 8, 2016 - 3:08 am

      Thanks for responding, Jasira. I know that some of my fellow black scholars have addressed some of this. Take, for example, Zandria Robinson’s description of formation as a metaphor for a black feminist, black queer, and black queer feminist theory of community organizing and resistance. It’s radical blackness in the margins, coming to the center. My research leans towards black, Latino and indigenous engagements with technology, from non-Western devices to Western platforms/software. I think there is plenty of territory to cover.

      • #11 by Jasira Monique on February 8, 2016 - 3:18 am

        Thanks so much for clarifying the depth of your focus which makes a lot of sense. I appreciate your writing. Thanks for responding so quickly.

    • #12 by nettrice on February 8, 2016 - 3:33 am

      To add: I will add a few lines about Mardi Gras Indian performers as it relates to the blog post.

  8. #13 by Jasira Monique on February 8, 2016 - 3:01 am

    There were so many wonderful points in this post, but I’m curious as to why the ever-present ‘Moors’ weren’t addressed, the tribute to Spike Lee’s ‘Chi-raq’ and the idea of ladies getting in formation to promote black feminist power? I think this piece if analyzing those were done would have definitely landed in the case study files at the university level. There is so much power in what was written, so I salute the brilliance and pan-Africanism here.

  9. #14 by jesusgaray on February 8, 2016 - 4:18 am

    This is great work – really thought out breakdown of music video imagery and black culture in a deeper way than I normally see.

  10. #15 by Cookie's Jam on February 8, 2016 - 10:44 am

    Thank you for such a great piece.

  11. #16 by aquariusloves on February 8, 2016 - 12:12 pm

    Reblogged this on bighairsecrets and commented:
    Life

  12. #17 by Enrica on February 8, 2016 - 10:49 pm

    Reblogged this on Afrosartorialism and commented:
    An interesting reading of Beyoncé’s Formation video by Dr. Nettrice Gaskins

  13. #18 by Wesley Issac Richardson on February 8, 2016 - 11:47 pm

    Great writing on the context of the work! The unique thing about the regional cinematic language of blacks is that it is woven into visual art sometimes subtlety,and sometimes overtly but either way it’s too often dismissed because viewers don’t get the visual metaphors invoked; thanks for putting it out there and breaking it down! We definitely need more of your discourse out here!

    • #19 by nettrice on February 9, 2016 - 12:40 am

      You’re welcome. I’ve been researching the devices and metaphors (vernacular) in the music video for some time now.

  14. #20 by Tima Samad on February 9, 2016 - 12:59 am

    Excellent!

  15. #21 by Orlando Green on February 9, 2016 - 1:43 am

    The article is everything.

  16. #22 by Ms. Love on February 9, 2016 - 1:47 am

    I would love to see a break down of the lyrics and how the video and lyrics relate.

  17. #24 by Ms. Love on February 9, 2016 - 1:56 am

    Reblogged this on Veni! Vidi! Que…? and commented:
    Powerful words and images.

  18. #25 by L Furtado on February 9, 2016 - 3:00 am

    Thank you for this.

    • #26 by nettrice on February 9, 2016 - 4:54 am

      You’re welcome. Thanks for reading.

  19. #27 by Tiffany Michellé on February 9, 2016 - 4:48 am

  20. #28 by adaahamefule on February 9, 2016 - 11:31 am

    Reblogged this on adaahamefule and commented:
    God Is A Black Woman.
    Beyoncé Formation is much deeper than you think

  21. #29 by James Everett on February 9, 2016 - 8:01 pm

    This is such an excellent article. The first time I watched the video I had to release a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. It completely floored me, even where I couldn’t articulate why. I have a degree in jazz music so it kind of embarrasses me that this subtext and iconography is completely unknown to me. Thanks for the crash course 🙂

    • #30 by nettrice on February 10, 2016 - 2:43 am

      Thanks for posting this response. It’s good to know that the information has been so well received.

  22. #31 by bettywaitherero on February 10, 2016 - 3:04 pm

    Reblogged this on Betty Waitherero's Blog and commented:
    Completely eye-opening and spiritual. I loved this article.

  23. #32 by allianapersaud on February 15, 2016 - 4:22 am

    Reblogged this on alliana persaud and commented:
    Love, love, love this! My professor shared this article in class recently & I speak for the entire classroom when I say that we were mesmerized by all the hidden messages in ‘Formation’ that this article brings to light. Must read.

    • #33 by nettrice on February 15, 2016 - 4:50 am

      Thanks for replying. I’m happy to read that the post was useful to you and your class.

  24. #34 by Mr. Militant Negro on February 15, 2016 - 4:30 am

    Reblogged this on The Militant Negro™.

  1. Getting in Line: Working Through Beyonce’s “Formation” | Red Clay Scholar
  2. ICYMI: Formation - Martina Clark - Writer
  3. Beyoncé as Conjure Woman: Reclaiming the Magic of Black Lives (That) Matter
  4. Black Secret Technology: Beyonce's Formation | ...
  5. The My-Stery: “Get In-Formation: Black Performance, Black Code and Black Spies” | Aker: Futuristically Ancient
  6. A round-up of “Formation” thinkpieces
  7. San Francisco Bay View » On Beyoncé’s In_Formation Day, Haiti revelers celebrate slaying Carnival King
  8. Koordinacija (političkog) pokreta: Beyoncéin “Formation” kao naputak za revoluciju
  9. The Battle for Equity: The Crisis & the Future | Renegade Futurism
  10. Wisdom of the Ancestors: Beyoncé’s Lemonade | Renegade Futurism
  11. Koordinacija (političkog) pokreta: Beyoncéin “Formation” kao naputak za revoluciju
  12. Witchcraft in Modern Music – Who Is the Modern Witch?

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

%d bloggers like this: