A Comparison of the Australian Aborigines and the Na’Vi in “Avatar” Essay Example

guerrilla wars against the Europeans. In addition the Europeans didn’t think of the Aboriginals as people because they didn’t have a “god”.

In the eyes of a European the aboriginals didn’t have a proper system of law or a belief system. Therefore they were not people. In avatar the Na’vi are seen as savages and are as well not seen as people. As Colonel Quatritch said “Look, Sully, I want you to learn this savages from the inside, I want you to gain their trust. ” Both groups weren’t seen as people they were seen as something close to animal. The Na’vi and the Aboriginals have slightly different views on the land “She said all energy is only borrowed, and one day you have to give it back. ” This sentence is Jake describing the Na’vi connection to the land.

He also describes how that all living things are connected by a “network of energy flowing through all living things”. The Na’vi also call the animals their brothers and say thank you to them when they kill them to eat. To the Na’vi it is a bad thing to kill an animal without the intention of using it for anything. The Aboriginals perspective differs slightly from that of the Na’vi. The Aboriginals believe that if you take care of the land then the land will take care of you. Their main reason for being nomadic is so that they can rest the land so that when they go back to that area it will be alive with their necessities.

Also if they kill something, a kangaroo for example, they will use everything

they can and create minimal waste. They will eat the kangaroo meat and then use the fur to make a coat or a blanket and they might use the bones as firewood or carve them into weapons. To both groups everything is a part of your family. Both invaders had reasons behind the invasion and both groups had reactions. The Europeans wanted to use the land to dispose of their convicts whereas the Westerners in Avatar wanted the small rock contained in the ground under HomeTree, called unobtanium, which sells for 20 million dollars per kilogram.

The Aboriginals tried to teach the Europeans their ways but quickly learnt that the Europeans weren’t going to learn. The Na’vi in avatar also do this. The Na’vi however take another student, Jake. After that each group ignored the invaders and tried to stay clear of them. After the invasion each group turns to warfare to solve their problems and mainly use them in self-defence. However the Na’vi have a person who has come from the invaders to fight with them. The aboriginal tribes didn’t have that. On the other hand both groups had the advantage of knowledge on their side.

After the invasions there were wars that caused so many to die but the actual war on Pandora took much less time than fights between the Aboriginals and Europeans. In addition the Europeans took the aboriginal children away from their families while the “sky people” tried to blend in with the Na’vi. Parker Selfridge stated in Avatar, “Look. You're supposed to be winning the hearts and minds of the natives. Isn't that the whole point of

your little puppet show? If you walk like them, you talk like them, they'll trust you. We build them a school, teach them English.

But after - how many years - the relations with the indigenous are only getting worse. ” This sentence is about the Westerners reaction to the invasion. It is about how the Westerners are trying to blend in. what they want most is the Unobtanium and are prepared to do anything to get it as Selfridge says in this statement : “Killing the indigenous looks bad, but there’s one thing shareholders hate more than bad press -- and that’s a bad quarterly statement. ” They are more worried about money rather than the lives of others.

In conclusion, the Na’vi in Avatar and the Aboriginal peoples have had similar circumstances and have similar views but their stories ended differently. The conflicts between the Aboriginal peoples and the Europeans lasted over a hundred years while the conflicts between the Na’vi and the Westerners seemed to last a matter of months. In addition the Aboriginal peoples didn’t have a person from the invading side come fight with them. However conditions for the Aboriginal peoples have improved- with the reconciliation by Kevin Rudd in 2008- and are still improving. They are similar yet insanely different.