A Cultural Blueprint

Now that you’ve been provided with a foundational background concerning the context of the story; i.e. characters, storyline/ plot, as well as the various other ways to view and perceive the movie, an important piece of this puzzle is waiting to be analyzed, the cultural interaction between humans and the Omaticaya tribe.

Though his initial meeting with the member was by accident, his interest and curiosity led him to training and an education to begin understanding a different culture unlike his own. Jake’s initiation into the tribe meant assimilating to its culture, and as he began to learn the culture and its language, attentively watching his peers to better understand proper emotional responses, adapting survival techniques and inherently becoming one of the Omaticayas in and out of the Avatar. This attachment led him to losing sight of his original purpose, rebelling against his commanders to fight for the very traditions and culture he had become apart of, altering his role of spy to hero.

The tree is essentially the quintessential core foundation of the tribe, comparable to the Christians and The Bible, Muslims and the Quran, etc., and without this valuable structure in tact, their culture would nearly cease to exist, which was Colonel Miles primary mission, eliminating an entire culture for the sole purpose of manipulating and exploiting the land for financial gains. He completely disregarded the Tree of Souls and all its glory, disturbing the current equilibrium to rip apart the relationship between the environment and its inhabitants, which would entail wiping out the tribe that believed in its mystical powers, as well as creating a dynamic conflict between the humans and the defenseless tribe, all because of the valuable soil underneath it all. This idea can best be related to the Gaard article discussing the dismissal of the oceanic traditions that existed amongst the Makah’s, “the Makah point to their tribe’s over two thousand –year-old tradition of whale hunting” (Gaard, 6). Environmentalists attempted to reason with the Makah tribe to preserve the whales that were being slaughtered, but to the Makahs it was not about the destruction of the breed but rather the necessity to maintain their identity. The entire whale hunting process was said to have provided “….a deeper understanding of the relationship between people, the mammals of the sea and the land” (Gaard, 7), much like the Omaticaya tribe who merely wanted to continue practicing their culture in peace without interruption from “eco-colonialists” or those wanting to control the weak.

One of the biggest, most important scenes is when Jake returns to reunite and empower the Omaticaya tribe “It’s time to send a message to the sky people that this itheir, the Navi’s land, but to do so, they first must go to each of the Navi clans to ask them to come fight as one”, reestablishing the element of faith to progress them towards freedom from the human disturbances. Meanwhile, the Colonel was suiting and booting up his troops for a battle he felt was already won against a ‘defenseless’ army, similar to the Environmentalist’s feelings towards the Makah tribe. Regardless of how the Makah and Omaticaya felt the battle would end, at the end of the day, they wouldn’t go without a fully armed assault to fight for their beliefs, traditions, and rituals united as one. Solid.