Rhetorical Analysis - Elastic Heart by Sia

Sia’s song and music video for Elastic Heart speak a lot about love and destruction.  Sia herself, has commented about the meaning of the video, tweeting “I anticipated some ‘pedophelia!!!’ Cries for this video.  All I can say is Maddie and Shia are two of the only actors I felt could play these two warring ‘sia’ self states.”  The music video features Maddie Ziegler and Shia LaBeouf trapped in a cage, fighting against one another, to signify Sia’s bipolar nature.  The video has received a lot of criticism, claiming to be too sexual with a young girl and an adult male, but the video really deserves credit for what it is: A woman who is facing an internal struggle between what she feels are two different versions of herself.

I would first like to talk about the lyrics of the song.  In the opening sentence, I stated that I think love is a component of this song.  The love that I am speaking about is not love with another person, but rather with herself.  The first verse speaks to this very well.  In lines 1-4, she says:

And another one bites the dust

Oh why can I not conquer love

And I might have thought that we were one

Wanted to fight this war without weapons

When I first read these lines, I thought she was talking about losing love with another person, but as I kept going on in the lyrics, I realized that she is talking about herself.  She “cannot conquer love,” meaning that she cannot accept herself for who she is.  She then says “thought that we were one,” possibly signifying that she thought she had gotten herself out of the mental depression, but it did not succeed.  She is using common phrases, such as ‘another one bites the dust’ and ‘make love not war’ to strengthen her argument.  They really put into effect just how badly she is hurting. 

                  Sia makes an interesting connection in the second verse.  Line 17 says, “And I know that I can survive.” That is referring to the 1992 Louis Malle movie, Damage.  The quote from the movie is “Remember.  Damaged people are dangerous.  They know they can survive.”  Sia is calling herself damaged, but she knows that she is can get through her struggles.  She moves on in that verse to say “and I want it, I want my life so bad/I’m doing everything I can,” (lines 19-20) which again reiterates how she is struggling but she wants to move on and go back to living her normal life. 

                  The pre-chorus “you did not break me/I’m still fighting for peace” are two interesting lines.  Again, at first they made me think that she was talking about someone else, when really the ‘you’ that she is referring to is her second personality that is not really her.  She wants to make peace with herself, but her other personality is not allowing herself to.  The chorus is like an anthem to herself to let her know that she is strong enough to fight this other bad personality that she has.  She is saying that she might come close to breaking, but she will not allow herself to be beat down by anything. 

In the music video, Maddie is representing the ‘bad’ Sia, while Shia is playing the ‘good’ Sia.  At the beginning of the video, you can tell that Shia is scared of Maddie, like he has gotten rid of her and does not want her to come back into his life.  At 1:33, Shia starts to climb towards the top of the cage, seeming like he wants to escape, looking down onto what he is trying to leave, wanting to get away, but finally he drops at 1:54.  The way he drops speaks a lot about how he really does not want to be plagued by the ‘bad’ anymore, trying his best to not touch her, because the mere act of even touching her will infect him again.  The ending, when Maddie is able to freely leave, shows the struggle that goes on once again.  He wants to go, he wants to leave the trapped being of himself, and is upset how she can just leave and come back whenever she wants.  It troubles him to see himself being stuck inside his cage. 

This song and music video speak heavily to people that are struggling with mental illness; how something that is not them is infecting their bodies without any control.  Sia does an outstanding job of portraying this in her lyrics, as well as in the direction of the music video. 

Sia - Elastic Heart feat. Shia LaBeouf & Maddie Ziegler (Official Video). 
     YouTube. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Sept. 2015. <https://www.youtube.com/ 
     watch?v=KWZGAExj-es>. 

"Sia - Elastic Heart Lyrivs." Genius. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Sept. 2015. 
     <http://genius.com/Sia-elastic-heart-lyrics>. 

"Sia - Lyrics." Sia. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Sept. 2015. <http://siamusic.net/ 
     lyrics>. 

sia (Sia).” I anticipated some ‘pedophelia!!!’ Cries for this video.  All I can say is Maddie and Shia are two of the only actors I felt could play.” 07 Jan 2015, 9:59 p.m. Tweet.

sia (Sia). “These two warring ‘sia’ self states.” 07 Jan 2015, 10:00 p.m. Tweet.