PANDORA'S BOX: RELIGION, ECOLOGY AND POPULAR CULTURE

Avatar & Nature Spirituality (Wilfrid Laurier University Press), 2013

Avatar and Nature Spirituality explores the cultural and religious significance of James Cameron’s film Avatar (2010), one of the most commercially successful motion pictures of all time. Its success was due in no small measure to the beauty of the Pandora landscape and the dramatic, heart-wrenching plight of its nature-venerating inhabitants. To some audience members, the film was inspirational, leading them to express affinity with the film’s message of ecological interdependence and animistic spirituality. Some were moved to support the efforts of indigenous peoples, who were metaphorically and sympathetically depicted in the film, to protect their cultures and environments. To others, the film was politically, ethically, or spiritually dangerous. Indeed, the global reception to the film was intense, contested, and often confusing. This document includes the book's Table of Contents and the contributions by its editor, Bron Taylor. To illuminate the film and its reception, this book draws on an interdisciplinary team of scholars, experts in indigenous traditions, religious studies, anthropology, literature and film, and post-colonial studies. Readers will learn about the cultural and religious trends that gave rise to the film and the reasons these trends are feared, resisted, and criticized, enabling them to wrestle with their own views about the film and the controversy. Like the film itself, Avatar and Nature Spirituality provides an opportunity for considering afresh the ongoing struggle to determine how we should live on our home planet, and what sorts of political, economic, and spiritual values and practices would best guide us.

Ekphrasis, 2009

This article is mainly a reading of ideologies that make of Cameron's "Avatar", based on the fact that Cameron has integrated multiple ideologies within the story frame of his 3D movie. The research starts with the discussion on the problem of avatars in the history of culture and philosophy and moves towards the description of concepts from neurosciences, deep ecologism and Marxism or Feminism that have influenced James Cameron's narrative. The author uses Northrop Frye's concept of double mirror, as a symbolic interpretation form, meant to explain the key oppositions in the movie, which are not only the relationship between human and aliens, but also those of mind over matter, nature versus technology and power against community. All these concepts are towards followed in their convergence a constant double representation, practiced with regard both to character development and narrativity and with respect to audience and actors, and in the changes of the dynamics of cinema production in the XXI Century. Doru POP THE "DOUBLE MIRROR" IN JAMES CAMERON'S AVATAR -PHILOSOPHY, ECOLOGY, IDEOLOGY AND ONTOLOGY ON PANDORA

European journal of literature, culture and the environment, 2011

espanolEn un articulo de opinion publicado a finales de 2009 en el "New York Times", Ross Douthat afirmo que la pelicula de James Cameron, "Avatar", era un ejemplo de propaganda panteista disenada para animar a la adoracion de la naturaleza en vez de a Dios. En este ensayo, evaluo las afirmaciones de Douthat, clasificandolas como un malentendido sobre el panteismo y como un sintoma del temor cristiano conservador de que el ambientalismo sea cripto-paganismo. Ofrezco una interpretacion alternativa de Eywa, la inteligencia planetaria de la pelicula, como una criatura, una figura de la diosa cristiana Natura, una descendiente del paganismo literario, y un indicio de una incipiente ecumene ambiental cristiana. EnglishIn an op-ed piece published in late 2009 in the "New York Times", Ross Douthat claimed that James Cameron's film "Avatar" was a piece of pantheist propaganda designed to encourage the worship of nature rather than God. In this ess...

2010

This paper is an ecopolitical interpretation of James Cameron's recent film, Avatar. By 'ecopolitical' is meant that the film is not merely ecologically significant -in so far as it stresses the vital interconnectedness of all living beings as well as with their environment -but communicates and promotes a political stance which should galvanize people into the kind of action that is intent on rescuing the planetary ecosystem(s) from continued exploitation and degradation at the hands of an economic (and political) system that is not receptive to the needs of living beings. Heidegger's critique of technology, as well as his understanding of art is enlisted to make sense of the remarkable fusion of advanced cinema technology and creative film-art in Avatar, and Joel Kovel's analysis of the phenomenon of life provides a conceptual grid for the interpretation of Cameron's thematization of life on the fictional planet of Pandora (which functions here as metaphor for Earth). It is argued that, through vieweridentification with the protagonists in the film, it engenders a 'transformative' experience on the part of audiences, allowing them to conceive of moving from a state of 'paralysis' (represented in the character of Jake) to one of ecopolitical action. Attention is also given to the countervailing images of technology and science projected by the film, as well as to the question, whether its representation of the relation between science and myth is commensurate with Nietzsche's conception of this relation and with Lyotard's distinction between narrative and scientific knowledge. Hierdie artikel is 'n eko-politiese interpretasie van James Cameron se film, Avatar. Met 'eko-politiese' word bedoel dat die film nie alleen ekologies relevant is nie -vir sover dit die onmisbare onderlinge verbintenis van alle lewende wesens, asook met hul omgewing, beklemtoon -maar dat dit ook 'n politiese houding kommunikeer en bevorder wat mense tot die soort handeling aanspoor wat daarop gerig is om die aarde se ekosisteme van voortgaande eksploitasie en degradering deur 'n ekonomiese (en politieke) sisteem wat nie ontvanklik is vir die behoeftes van lewende wesens nie, te red. Heidegger se kritiek van tegnologie, sowel as sy begrip van kuns word ingespan om die merkwaardige samesmelting van gevorderde film-tegnologie en kreatiewe filmkuns in Avatar te verstaan, en Joel Kovel se analise van die verskynsel van lewe voorsien 'n begripsraamwerk om Cameron se tematisering van lewe op die fiktiewe planeet Pandora (as metafoor vir die aarde) te kan interpreteer. Daar word betoog dat, via gehoor-identifisering met die karakters in die film, 'n 'transformerende' ervaring by kykers teweeggebring word, wat hulle in staat stel om van 'n toestand van 'verlamming' (soos in die karakter van Jake beliggaam) in een van ekopolitiese handeling oor te gaan. Daar word ook aandag geskenk aan die uiteenlopende beelde van tegnologie en wetenskap wat die rolprent projekteer, sowel as aan die vraag, of die verhouding tussen wetenskap en mite wat daardeur voorgestel word, versoenbaar is met Nietzsche se opvatting hiervan, asook met Lyotard se onderskeid tussen narratiewe en wetenskaplike kennis.

Ecopsychology, 2010

A Critical Companion to James Cameron, ed. A.Barkman & A.Sanna. Lexington Books, 2019

Avatar, SF Mannerism and the Anthropocene. Maurizia Natali In 2009, James Cameron's story of the planet Pandora and its fabulous blue aliens called Na'vi under attack by the techno-scientific apparatus of terrestrials became an instant blockbuster 1. Motion-captured from real actors, these augmented humanoids with cat-like features (teeth, noses, ears, golden eyes and tails, a striped skin and four fingers) practice ecologically correct exchanges with the bio-network of Pandora by plugging in animals or plants their elegant braids, a loss we may lament in the progress of Darwinian genealogy. Avatar combines bio-political issues such as body morphing, neo-imperialist ecocide, gender and inter-species power, matriarchal mysticism. The film got the endorsement of environmentalists as a universal allegory of imperialist destruction, and as a warning tale Cameron addressed to American and global audiences. This chapter examines Avatar's connected aesthetics and politics to discover the uopian potentialities even a blockbuster may contain. It considers the film as a neo-Mannerist example of Science Fiction in the representation of bodies and landscapes and simultaneously examines the ecocidal attack on Pandora in relationship to the current debate on the Anthropocene (some properly call it Capitalocene). With such term, scientists, environmentalists and philosophers have redefined the current age as one in which human economy, resource exploitation and wars have become global geological factors producing catastrophic climate and environmental mutations. From an art-historical point of view, the beautiful Na'vi and Pandora's fabulous Eden belong to the aesthetic genealogy of idealized bodies and landscapes invented by Renaissance and Mannerist artists at the dawn of the Anthropocene when Europe was the first modern imperialist power. Today, new fabulous creatures animate the popular culture of Hollywood's digital empire. Particularly, Cameron's natives, animals and landscapes are comparable to the 1 24 For Machiavelli, see Jacques Derrida, "Le loup oublie' de Machiavel", Le monde doplomatique, Sept. 2008, p. 3.

The success of James Cameron's Avatar can be located in its stunning visuals, imaginative world-building and a straightforward narrative propounding colonial and ecological concerns, which culminate in the oppressed successfully rooting out the white, Eurocentric oppressor. However, such allegorizing is limited by a gaze that locates the "human" as separate from the "animal" and "nature". This study aims to analyse the speculative biology of Pandora and its symbiotic ecosystem, which is posited as "better" than the 'invading' humans' metal-based technology. It questions the romanticised idea of nature as an assemblage of indigenous people, fauna and flora. Finally, this paper investigates the various anthropocentric currents running through the film, critiques the Na'vi's subtle 'humanistic' dominance over other fauna, and delves into the possibility of adopting a truly unbiased lens to encapsulate the experiences of the marginalized non-human.

For the human species, migration has not only been a matter of survival, but also of empowerment, for example. Man's pointless exploitation of nature causes his own destruction Fritjof Capra in The Web of life says that if one disturbs one strand of the spider's web the whole web is impacted. Similarly harm caused to one life form disturbs the whole cosmic balance. Despite being fictional, films in turn can influence the reality of the environmental concerns. Oftentimes it takes images of planetary annihilation to motivate people into action after years of sitting idly by watching things slowly decay. James Cameron's Avatar (film) is about Man-Environment relationship and it concentrates on its permanent cycle of evolution, destruction, and sustainable development. Ecocriticism provides me the necessary tools to successfully associate my theory with Avatar, through which the visual medium presence the environmental and ecological crisis in order to warn the human society...

Human Arenas Springer Nature, 2024

Arne Dekke Eide Naess' Deep ecology philosophy asserts the need to acknowledge the inherent value of all living organisms irrespective of their usefulness to the human species. Naess argues the same through eight points that discuss the core ideas of deep ecology and how it is necessary to help attain this realization as an individual. This paper analyses James Cameron's film Avatar and how it explores the deep ecological connections of the indigenous Na'vi people of the fictional world of Pandora. The paper examines the various stages through which Jake Sully (narrator) experiences these connections and embarks on a journey of self-realization as proposed by Arne Naess. Research findings of the current study illustrate that cinematic storylines can contribute to ecological ethics and awareness. It accentuates the similarity between the themes of Arne Dekke Eide Naess' Deep Ecology philosophy and James Cameron's AVATAR. The film resonates with the profound connection between Na'vi and the natural world, Na'vi's objection to misuse of the environment, Sully's self-actualization reflecting Naess' eco-centric principles, environmental activism and bio-centric ethics. The paper also draws parallels between the fictional world of Pandora to Earth and the Na'vi people as a representation of our indigenous past and present values. The paper concludes on how Jake's Self-Realization of the inherent value of the planet and its life forms leads to his inner transformation from ego or self to Eco or Self.