The Super Bowl Halftime Show

“If one wanted to create from scratch a sport that reflected the sexual, racial, and organizational priorities of American social structure, it is doubtful that one could improve on football.”

— Michael Real (1975)

The Super Bowl halftime show has become a visible and representative battleground in its own right, and upon which American ideals, injustices, and cultural ideologies are actively exercised and contested. Considered one of the most coveted stages in the music industry, the opportunity to perform at the halftime show, while unpaid, positions artists among a select and elite roster of musical acts and promises a key boost in post-performance artist sales. In the wake of recent national anthem protests at professional and amateur sporting events and the direct action of key figures like former NFL player Colin Kaepernick, the halftime show has re-emerged as a central site of contestation where the activism of athletes and artists collide. Rihanna’s decision to refuse the invitation to perform at Super Bowl LIII in solidarity with Kaepernick led both sports and music journalists to reconsider the role, power, and platform of the Super Bowl halftime show, specifically, and the “appropriateness” of athlete and artist activism, more generally.

As SB Nation reported, “What used to be one of music’s biggest honors--a sign of reaching a transcendent level of stardom--has become the league’s largest remaining platform for dissent.” In this work, we argue that the halftime show--historically constructed as an entertainment spectacle--alerts us to larger cultural collisions, injustices, and structures of power that at once (re)configure and (re)construct popular notions of American identity and the role and place of the athlete/artist activist. 

Through a close reading of Super Bowl halftime shows, we explore the historical interrelation between sports, music, and activism at the Super Bowl halftime show, and traces the evolution of the performance as it evolved from featuring local marching bands and drill teams to today’s practice of spotlighting mainstream pop artists. With sonic artist/theorist Brandon LaBelle’s (2010) conceptualization of “acoustic territories” as our guiding framework, this presentation interrogates the site-specific, socio-cultural “topography” of the Super Bowl halftime show. We also turn to Sarah Banet-Weiser’s (2018) notion of “economies of visibility” to examine how the mediated visibility of the halftime show has framed and historicized these moments. Further informed by the work of performance scholars (Taylor, 2016; Schechner, 2013), music scholars (Street, 2012), sporting scholars (Dyreson, 2017; Hopsicker, 2017; Real, 1975), and others whose work specifically explores the intersection between politics and performance at the halftime show (Burns, 2005; Anderson, 2014; Gammage, 2017), we consider how the renewed focus on the contemporary soft drink-sponsored halftime show connects to and reflects its status as a cultural and historical space of both profit and protest.

Related Projects & Publications

Johnson, P.B., & Cox, C.M. (2019). “I said no to the Super Bowl”: The politics of performance and refusal in Super Bowl halftime shows, 1991 – 2018. Cultural Studies Association Conference. New Orleans, LA.

Johnson, P.B., & Cox, C.M. (2019). “Superbowling” for change: The acoustic territory of the Super Bowl halftime show. Sports Communication and Social Justice Pre-Conference. International Communication Association 69th Annual Conference. Washington, D.C.