The epic science fiction film, Avatar, sets a plot of a human organization, Resources Development Administration (RDA), attempting to mine a mineral, Unobatanium, found on a jungle moon known as Pandora. The purpose of mining was to find alternative resources to solve energy crisis as Earth’s resources were severely depleted by 2154. The mining activity extended to the village of Na'vi, an indigenous group living in an area called Hometree. Jake, a paraplegic marine, is enlisted in the Avatar program. He successfully infiltrates into the Na'vi community and has provides information about the Na'vi so that RDA may know how to persuade them to move away from Hometree and how to hit invade if they do not concede. In return, Jake will gain money for his leg operation to walk again. The story went on to show RDA’s strategy to compel the Na’vi fails in the end.
This paper attempts to analyze Avatar sociologically by identifying the different forms of social stratification and their mechanisms from the two groups of civilization namely the the Na'vi and the human organisations.
The Na'vi
The Na'vi are humanoid creatures that live on Pandora and are the only species that exhibit consciousness and intelligence that are similar to human.
The Na’vi society fits the definition of indigeny where the people live in a same concrete place. Hometree, for a long time but their territory is not politically defined (Benjamin, 2012). As an indigenous group, the Na’vi is seen not as possessors of the land but as a part of the place they live in which is the non-exploitative trait of indigeny (Benjamin, 2012).
The Na’vi’s attitude and orientation to the land is seen to be borrowed and revered. They live in harmony with nature and revere every live eve...
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...ut as the Na’vi do not see anything they need anything from the exogeny system.
Avatar has shown that the Navi’s indigeny and RDA’s exogeny are in conflict with each other. Exogeny has a consumption attitude towards the nature and objectify nature resources for the benefits of human society. Indigeny has an awareness of the nature and strive to live in harmony with the environment. From the quote that “all energy is only borrowed, and one day you have to give it back”, shows the Na’vi’s caring and gratitude attitudes towards nature rather than wishing only to take from nature as exogeny sees it as their entitlement. Although the Na’vi do not share the human genetic traits, RDA perceives the Na’vi as lower being than human in terms of racial identification. This shows that ethnicity is subjective matter as it is based on what one perceives (Cornell & Hartman, 2007).
To conclude, there are clearly many ways in which the events of chapter 12 and the movie “Avatar” resemble each other. Not only are there numerous examples of similarities, but there are also numerous examples of differences as well. For instance, the whites tried to remove the Native Americans from their homelands, and the humans tried to remove the Na’vi from their homelands. Although, the whites succeeded, whereas the humans did not. In addition, many people died in both cases, however, in different ways.
Elizabeth Fernea entered El Nahra, Iraq as an innocent bystander. However, through her stay in the small Muslim village, she gained cultural insight to be passed on about not only El Nahra, but all foreign culture. As Fernea entered the village, she was viewed with a critical eye, ?It seemed to me that many times the women were talking about me, and not in a particularly friendly manner'; (70). The women of El Nahra could not understand why she was not with her entire family, and just her husband Bob. The women did not recognize her American lifestyle as proper. Conversely, BJ, as named by the village, and Bob did not view the El Nahra lifestyle as particularly proper either. They were viewing each other through their own cultural lenses. However, through their constant interaction, both sides began to recognize some benefits each culture possessed. It takes time, immersed in a particular community to understand the cultural ethos and eventually the community as a whole. Through Elizabeth Fernea?s ethnography on Iraq?s El Nahra village, we learn that all cultures have unique and equally important aspects.
Throughout time, many people feel as if they have lost their connection to their cultural from outside influences and numerous disruptions. Disruptions to one’s cultural can be seen in the Picture book The Rabbits by john Marsden and Shaun tan which is an an allegory of the invasion of Australia. Another example is the film avatar by James Cameron. The creators of these works are expressing the effect of man on nature and disruption it brings upon the cultural of the indigenous people who are the traditional owners of the land.
There are many cultures throughout the world, which may be far apart and yet still have similarities. Two of those such cultures, the Basseri, that live in Iran, and the Nuer, whom live in Sudan, have their differences, but also have some similarities. Many of the differences and similarities come from their subsistence strategies and the social and political organization of their societies. With the regions of the world, both the Basseri and the Nuer live in, they’ve had to adapt to the environment they live in along with the limitations imposed by that environment.
It is these people that lived in tribes, and to this day, most of them remain devoted to their principles and their people. This is because of the fact that they recognize the significance of such values; they know what matters more, and having calculated individuality and its risks most of them are aware untying themselves from their people.
Avatar the motion picture throws you into a rich world, with diverse characters who clash over cultural and socio-economic issues. At the heart of the story is a former Marine named Jake Sully, who falls in love while on an alien planet with a woman from a race of people called the Na’vi. The character whom he falls in love with is an alien for which he sacrifices his whole way of life to be with. By way of his experiences with the Na’vi, he begins to adopt a new worldview, which can only be described as Pantheism.
After reading Horace Miner’s Body Ritual Among the Nacirema I cannot say that I would want to be part of the tribe. A huge reason would be that I could never go from my own Christian faith to the religious practices of the Nacirema. My second reason for not wanting to be part of the tribe is that I could never be subjected to the horrific medical practices and “magical potions” used on every citizen in the tribe.
LaDuke, Winona. All Our Relations: Native Struggles for Land and Life. Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1999. Print.
Colonialism transformed the indigenous life of the Yanomami, the Maasai, the Hawai’ians, the Aborigines and hundreds of other indigenous peoples. Industrialization moved humanity beyond the “world in which people mattered to a world in which they are expendable” (Wolfe). Today, still entrenched in the imperialistic ideology of colonialism by modern forms of globalization, nation states noisily quarrel over the rights to exploit both land and people for economic power without regard to indigenous existence. Non-Hawaiian haoles crudely render false historical interpretations of their “settler society” as a blessed yoke of “civilization” to the pitiful “feudal” Hawaiians (Trask). Some indigenous people attempt to assimilate, as “for years [one Aboriginal man] had ‘sweetened’ himself up just like tea, trying to make himself and others understood [to invading Western cultures]’” but “‘nothing been come back. Just nothing’” (Rose 195). Without political muscle, indigenous people are forced to promote ecologically harmful projects, such as hydroelectric dam proposals, to survive within the paradigm of the Western world.
Almost two hundred years ago a gadget called camera was invented and, after some years, the television and cinema were created. Nowadays, the movie industry has become one of the largest industries with millions of employees and producers. But have you ever wondered how much these movies actually cost to make? Well, it seems that the average cost to make a movie is around $66 million and all that for just one and a half hour or even two and a half hours in some cases. But which is the most expensive movie ever made ? Could it be Mr. Cameron’s Avatar?
In the “Iks” by Lewis Thomas, the author describes how a small tribe of hunters from northern Uganda called the Iks tries to survive after being forced by the government to give up their homes and living area and move to a poor hills and become farmers. Society is extremely harsh towards the Iks and this causes them to rebel and become abnormal. The Iks were a bunch of selfish people who only cared about themselves, left elders to starve and die, and did not cared about the children. They didn’t share things with each other and they find joy in the other’s misfortunes. Anthropologist were sent to observe the Iks, an anthropologist described the Iks to be ill- mannered fashion. Over the two years he had studied there, he was constantly being harassed and disgraced. After he had published his book, he wrote how he despised the Iks. Thomas then went on to say that he now sees similar behaviors implying on nations and cities compared to the Iks making points saying that the Iks share common characteristics of greed, cruezl, and selfish just like different nations fighting against each other.
Early explores and colonist found the Iroquois well establish as they had been for many generations with a democratic government, with a form at religion that acknowledged a creator in heaven; with a strong sense of family which was used on, and controlled by their women.
. Noble Eco-Savage (Avatar) is a stereotype used today that basically describes all indigenous people as being good at caring for our environment, and never doing any harm to it. In the movie Avatar this is very true for the movie Avatar even if it is not so true in our real world. The Navi are very thankful to their environment and waste very little as well. They believe everything is a cycle and even proceed to thank there prey and apologize after they kill it. You see this example in the film when Jake Sully kills his prey and then proceeds to caress it, apologize for killing it, then proceed to tell it why he killed it. This was a huge change for Jake because at the beginning of the movie Jake was about to get attacked by strange creatures and Neytiri killed them. After she killed them she scolded him and said “they did not have to die.” She then proceeded to call him a baby for not understanding why they did not have to die.
The books author, James (Sákéj) Youngblood Henderson came to write this book as a result of living with his wife, Marie Battiste (a celebrated Mi’kmaw scholar and educator) in her Mi’kmaq community of Eskasoni (10). It was the community of Eskasoni that compelled Henderson to compile their histories in a form that would not disrupt the Mi’kmaq worldviews, culture and spirituality they represent but as well easily conveyable to non-Aboriginal peoples.
Every society has its own origin and significance. Angami tribes are One of the well accepted is that the Naga Tribes in naga land and are one of the most powerful society who have inhabited the Naga Hills for several centuries. Though there is no real evidences to identify the real origin of this tribel society, there are certain beliefs and theories. J.H Hutton, who served as an administrator from 1917-1935 in Naga Hills, recorded that the Angami people are the first tribal society who have been settled in Northeast India. To clarify the real origin of this angami society, a study case was conducted with the head and local people of the villages. In that survey, it was found that the society had their own folk