Avatar Essay
Shayla Derr
Our historical globalization is important to how our society and culture is formed and shaped to this day. The movie Avatar, directed by James Cameron, has strong connections to our historical globalization. It represents our past, but the movie is set in the future. The “Sky People” tried to develop cultural contact and colonialism with the Na’vi people of Pandora. Avatar ties to our historical globalization through conflicts of ethnocentrism, marginalization and apathy. It shows the past, repeating itself.
The“Sky People” (people from Earth, given the name Sky People by the Na’vi), expressed ethnocentrism on a wide scale, throughout Avatar. All the Sky People were are after a precious metal, called Unobtainium, which is located under the surface of Pandora.And mainly under the Hometree. But the Hometree was basically a home to the Na'vi. And the only way to get to the Unobtainium was to destroy the Hometree. Jake Sully, a main character in Avatar, took on the identity of a Na'vi, to gain access to the Hometree. Also to develope cutltural contact with the Na'vi. But no matter what the Sky People offered, the Na'vi were not interested. Soon the Unobtainium was top priority and the rights, beliefs, land and culture of the Na'vi, didn't mean a thing to the Sky People. The Sky People thought their rights over weighed the rights of the Na'vi. "White Man's Burden" ties into ethnocentrism as it is: the duty to take care of people of a different race. It ties into ethnocentrism because the Sky People felt they had to get the Na'vi to like them, so they could dominate and be "the best". The ethnocentrism levels that were distributed by the Sky People put the Na'vi into a lesser place of power.
“So what? They can move to another tree!” quoted from Avatar’s Parker Selfridge. The Sky People didn’t see the importance of the Hometree or the Na’vi’s relationship with the land and nature. They marginalized the Na’vi’s rights and went ahead and took over the land. They showed little empathy for the Na’vi and how the Na’vi lived off the land. This relates to when the Europeans forced the First Nations onto reserves and set the First Nations below them in class and society. But the Sky People are not the only ones at fault for pushing away a different culture. The Na’vi didn’t want anything to do with the Sky People.“Your fault! You are like a baby; making noise, don't know what to do. You should not come here, all of you! You only come and make problems. Only.”Avatar’s Neytiri snaps at Jake Sully when she has killed the wolves to save him. Neytiri here shows the Na’vi’s hatred for the Sky People and the Sky People’s carelessness for the Na’vi’s land. Although it is not a sign of marginalization because the Na'vi are not putting the Sky People into a position of lesser power.
The Sky People set up colonies on Pandora, on the Na’vi’s land, caring little about what they were affecting. This made the cultural contact between the two cultures strained and unpleasant. The Sky People thought of the Na’vi as dumb savages, and didn’t care about their connections the nature and land. This outraged the Na'vi, and they took a stand. Jake Sully integration with the Na'vi and discovered how precious everything was and what his own people were destroying. He too rose up and fought for what he now believed.
The actions that were made in the movie Avatar by the Sky People, relate to the actions of the Europeans when they came to North America. The Europeans thought their rights overpowered the rights of the First Nations, much like the Sky People with the Na’vi. They pushed the First Nations rights, religions and culture aside and marginalized the First Nations, which also relates to Avatar. And lastly, they made little effort at cultural contact with the First Nations to try and learn and empathy their religion and ways of life. Instead, the Europeans set up colonies and forced them onto reserves. Putting them into lower class and society. The movie Avatar has a strong connection to our past. Even though our history is in the past, Avatar is set in the future. It is history repeating itself. And I think it is important that we remember what happened and never let it happen again.
Our historical globalization is important to how our society and culture is formed and shaped to this day. The movie Avatar, directed by James Cameron, has strong connections to our historical globalization. It represents our past, but the movie is set in the future. The “Sky People” tried to develop cultural contact and colonialism with the Na’vi people of Pandora. Avatar ties to our historical globalization through conflicts of ethnocentrism, marginalization and apathy. It shows the past, repeating itself.
The“Sky People” (people from Earth, given the name Sky People by the Na’vi), expressed ethnocentrism on a wide scale, throughout Avatar. All the Sky People were are after a precious metal, called Unobtainium, which is located under the surface of Pandora.And mainly under the Hometree. But the Hometree was basically a home to the Na'vi. And the only way to get to the Unobtainium was to destroy the Hometree. Jake Sully, a main character in Avatar, took on the identity of a Na'vi, to gain access to the Hometree. Also to develope cutltural contact with the Na'vi. But no matter what the Sky People offered, the Na'vi were not interested. Soon the Unobtainium was top priority and the rights, beliefs, land and culture of the Na'vi, didn't mean a thing to the Sky People. The Sky People thought their rights over weighed the rights of the Na'vi. "White Man's Burden" ties into ethnocentrism as it is: the duty to take care of people of a different race. It ties into ethnocentrism because the Sky People felt they had to get the Na'vi to like them, so they could dominate and be "the best". The ethnocentrism levels that were distributed by the Sky People put the Na'vi into a lesser place of power.
“So what? They can move to another tree!” quoted from Avatar’s Parker Selfridge. The Sky People didn’t see the importance of the Hometree or the Na’vi’s relationship with the land and nature. They marginalized the Na’vi’s rights and went ahead and took over the land. They showed little empathy for the Na’vi and how the Na’vi lived off the land. This relates to when the Europeans forced the First Nations onto reserves and set the First Nations below them in class and society. But the Sky People are not the only ones at fault for pushing away a different culture. The Na’vi didn’t want anything to do with the Sky People.“Your fault! You are like a baby; making noise, don't know what to do. You should not come here, all of you! You only come and make problems. Only.”Avatar’s Neytiri snaps at Jake Sully when she has killed the wolves to save him. Neytiri here shows the Na’vi’s hatred for the Sky People and the Sky People’s carelessness for the Na’vi’s land. Although it is not a sign of marginalization because the Na'vi are not putting the Sky People into a position of lesser power.
The Sky People set up colonies on Pandora, on the Na’vi’s land, caring little about what they were affecting. This made the cultural contact between the two cultures strained and unpleasant. The Sky People thought of the Na’vi as dumb savages, and didn’t care about their connections the nature and land. This outraged the Na'vi, and they took a stand. Jake Sully integration with the Na'vi and discovered how precious everything was and what his own people were destroying. He too rose up and fought for what he now believed.
The actions that were made in the movie Avatar by the Sky People, relate to the actions of the Europeans when they came to North America. The Europeans thought their rights overpowered the rights of the First Nations, much like the Sky People with the Na’vi. They pushed the First Nations rights, religions and culture aside and marginalized the First Nations, which also relates to Avatar. And lastly, they made little effort at cultural contact with the First Nations to try and learn and empathy their religion and ways of life. Instead, the Europeans set up colonies and forced them onto reserves. Putting them into lower class and society. The movie Avatar has a strong connection to our past. Even though our history is in the past, Avatar is set in the future. It is history repeating itself. And I think it is important that we remember what happened and never let it happen again.
You have a lot of ideas and that is good. This essay has potential to be a really good essay. you have a few small structural issues and are lacking in some content.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to structure the first thing I suggest is to omit the first line because you basically repeat it in new wording a couple sentences later. I also want to make a suggestion to your thesis. A thesis in a paper of this length can be summed up in one sentence (like the examples i gave in class). Yours takes multiple sentences which is fine. But you need to remember that the thesis is your position and a road map to where the essay is going. Your position is clear: "The movie Avatar, directed by James Cameron, has strong connections to our historical globalization. It represents our past, when the Europeans came to North America and took over the rights and land of the First Nations, but in the future. " The road map portion is not so clear: "The “Sky People” tried to develop cultural contact, assimilation, and colonialism with the Na’vi people of Pandora. It also ties to our historical globalization through conflicts of ethnocentrism, marginalization, apathy, and depopulation. It shows our historical globalization, repeating itself."
That is a lot of stuff to cover in the essay. Some of these subjects you didn't even discuss. Assimilation should probably be left out. The Europeans tried to assimilate the First Nations but it doesn't quite happen in the movie. the topics that I gathered from reading the rest of your essay are Ethnocentrism, Marginalization and Colonization (in that order). You might want to omit these lines and reword them along the lines of: Like historical globalization the movie portrays examples of Ethnocentrism, Marginalization and Colonization.
You didn't mention Ethnocentrism in the first body paragraph (although that is what it appears you are discussing). Remember to properly use as much class vocabulary as you can. You also want to refer to as much course content as you can in order to develop a comprehensive essay. In the second paragraph mention "white Man's Burden" and how it relates to the thinking of the Europeans as well as the Sky-People. You may even want to mention Social Darwinism.
The marginalization paragraph shows that you clearly understand the concept. I thought it was interesting to see your take on the possible faults of the Na'vi people. Yours is the first essay I have read that lays any blame on the Na'vi. I am not saying that you shouldn't discuss that (because I find it interesting) but you might want to be careful. the topic of this paragraph is marginalization. You are right in that the Na'vi did not want anything to do with the Sky-Peoples culture. I like that you made that point, but you may want to clarify that it was not quite marginalization because they did not put the Sky-People in a position of lesser power.
There are a few problems with the last body paragraph. The topic is colonization but you do not spend much time discussing colonization. The majority of the paragraph appears to be about plot, conflict, as well as ethnocentrism and marginalization (again). You do not have to use colonization as a main topic if you do not want to. Perhaps there is another topic that you may want to discuss more. Perhaps imperialism/colonialism.
Remember to use as much class vocabulary and content as you can to develop a comprehensive essay. I would also like you to remember to read this out loud and have someone else read it to you out loud. There are some small grammatical issues throughout.