AVATAR MIDTERM

In the movie Avatar, the aliens(humans) landed on the planet Pandora, invading the lands of the Na'vi. The humans were looking for a rock called Unobtainium in order to improve upon humankind's existence. However their search for Unobtainium was devastating the lands of the native Na'vi and threatened their very existence. The rock was located under a tree that housed all the Na'vi population and the human invaders were determined to uproot it in order to obtain the rock which is in the soil. The team of scientist came up with these Avatars that acted and talked and walked like the Na'vi using the brain waves that were synced into the Avatar body. The point was to get the Na'vi to trust Jake which is the main character. In hopes to that Jake could talk the Na'vi in relocating or conform to the aliens. In the process Jake falls in love wit Neytiri which is the princess of Omaticaya and Jake falls in love with the land as well. Jake then "betrays" the humans the humans by helping the Na'vi keep their land from the humans. In the movie the word "see" comes up a lot. The meaning behind "see" is to understand and be knowledgeable of the land and to view things from their viewpoint. Humans felt that their superiority gave them the right to deem a lesser species (the Na'vi). This is an example of a master narrative. The humans wanted more and more in order to ensure that their existence continued. They felt that humankind needed more certain traits and saw that the Na'vi did not posses the traits, therefore they deemed them savages. (Anthropocentrism) Self narrative falls in to play when Jake and Grace along with their team differed from the humans because they saw value in the Na'vi's culture where the others only saw primative existence. The dualisms I found were between the colonel and Grace. The colonel holds rank over the scientsit, Grace and he is considered a male dominate and views Grace's sympathy and need to understand the Nav'i as more silly female whims that he had no time for. Deriving them to be frivilous. The humans saw the Na'vi as savages becausw they did not want to accept their "advanced" ways. The Na'vi saw their "advanced" ways as evil and destructive. Solidarity was shown when Grace and her team of scientist including Jake felt for the natives and didnt want the humans to destroy their land. Also the woman that flew one of the helicopters had a change of heart. When she she seen how they were lettig of missles to destroy the land she turned around and said "I didnt sign up for this." After that she began helping Jake and Grace with saving the land and the Na'vi. World traveler concept shows in this particular view of it with Jake being able to play both sides as being human and also taking form of his Avatar body. Coming into his Avatar body he didnt have any concept of how the Na'vi felt about their land. Neytiri took him under her wing and basically transformed him into one of the natives by teaching him the way of life. Colonialism in this matter was not reached fully, because the humans were not able to take control over the land. They did, however offered them roads, schools, hospitals, and so on, butthe Na'vi refused. I see partial colonialism in the force of trying to invade Pandora by destroying and killing the Na'vi and animals. Truncated narratives shows the same concept as the Europeans coming to the Americas and forcing the Indians off the land. So the Europeans can settle and start civilization. Just as the humans tried to do on Pandora against the Na'vi. Jake only seen half of the problem with what was going on with the Na'vi. He didnt grasp the full concept that Pandora was more than just a place to live, it was their way of life. He started this expierement helping the humans move the Na'vi off the land, but once he fell in love and learned that forest gave out much more than a place to live, but it was also spiritual. They communicated with the forest and all the things that lived in it.
"Inevitably, in the translation of ethical perspectives between cultures with
differential power, something will be lost, what Ofelia Schutte calls "a residue
of meaning" that is so important that it may be "'a principle of cross-cultural
incommensurability'"(Gaard 19).