{"id":6713,"date":"2010-01-29T12:12:44","date_gmt":"2010-01-29T17:12:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/?p=6713"},"modified":"2010-01-29T13:49:38","modified_gmt":"2010-01-29T18:49:38","slug":"what-you-hear-kemo-sabe-does-avatar-merely-revive-old-movie-stereotypes-of-the-white-savior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/?p=6713","title":{"rendered":"“What You Hear, Kemo Sabe?”: Does Avatar<\/i> Merely Revive Old Movie Stereotypes of the “White Savior”?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"avatarx-topper-medium\"<\/a><\/p>\n

James Cameron’s Avatar<\/em><\/a> has been hailed for its medium-busting visual effects and astounding commercial success. Since its release on December 18th it has repeatedly topped the box-office in multiple countries, and is now the highest-grossing film in history, having taken in nearly $1.9 billion worldwide.<\/p>\n

But, underneath the breathtaking graphics and lifelike performance capture, does the story of Neytiri and Jakesully, above, just retell the story of a white person finding himself by “going native”? Is it merely a fable about Europeans who would take over non-white people, save for the leadership of a Caucasian guy who leaves his reprehensible, bloodthirsty tribe, in order to cast his fate with the natives?<\/p>\n

Avatar<\/em> has famously been compared to Kevin Costner’s Oscar-winning, 1990 work, Dances With Wolves<\/em>, which also raised similar charges regarding the consistency of the “white savior” myth. Disney’s Pocahontas<\/em> has also been i.d.-d as Avatar<\/em>‘s spiritual predecessor, though, perhaps no more pointedly than in these two YouTube clips, the first of which remixes video from Avatar<\/em> to audio from Pocahontas<\/em>‘s trailer, and the latter which does the reverse.<\/p>\n

You need to a flashplayer enabled browser to view this YouTube video<\/em><\/object><\/p>\n

You need to a flashplayer enabled browser to view this YouTube video<\/em><\/object><\/p>\n

Today, this afternoon, Friday, April 25, at 2 pm ET, on my WBAI-NY \/ 99.5 FM radio show, NONFICTION, my guests are:<\/p>\n

Rebecca Keegan<\/strong>, author of The Futurist: The Life and Films of James Cameron<\/em><\/a>;<\/p>\n

Dr. Mikhail Lyubansky<\/strong>, a professor in the psychology department of Psychology at the University of Illinois: Urbana-Champaign. He authored “The Racial Politics of Avatar: Part 1”<\/a> and “The Racial Politics of Avatar: Part 2”<\/a> for Psychology Today<\/em>‘s web site<\/a>;<\/p>\n

Dr. Raymond A. Winbush<\/strong>, author of three books on race issues<\/a>, and director of the Institute for Urban Research at Morgan State University<\/a>. His post, “Avatar, Africans and Racism: Some Brief Reflections on James Cameron\u2019s Tale about White Supremacy,”<\/a> appears on his blog, Reparations for Enslavement and the Blackside of Things<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

They’ll talk about Avatar<\/em>, race, and these issues, with the goal of giving listeners some clarity on them.<\/p>\n

\"chrismatthews\"<\/a>But first: After the President’s state-of-the-union address this past Wednesday, Chris Matthews, right, of MSNBC’s Hardball<\/em><\/a> fame, opined that Obama “is post-racial, by all appearances. I forgot he was black tonight for an hour.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’ll talk with Jesse Washington, race and ethnicity editor for The Associated Press<\/em>, and author of the essay, “Do Blacks Truly Want to Transcend Race?”<\/a> about what Matthews meant, and what it means for Obama and our national understanding of the subject.<\/p>\n

You can hear these thoughtful individuals’ ideas by tuning in at 2 pm. If you’re outside of the New York tri-state, check out our live stream<\/a> on the web. If you miss the live show, dig into our archives<\/a> for up to 90 days after broadcast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

James Cameron’s Avatar has been hailed for its medium-busting visual effects and astounding commercial success. Since its release on December 18th it has repeatedly topped the box-office in multiple countries, and is now the highest-grossing film in history, having taken in nearly $1.9 billion worldwide. But, underneath the breathtaking graphics and lifelike performance capture, does […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23,48,46,33,51,18,7,15,47,8,20,53,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6713"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6713"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6735,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6713\/revisions\/6735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/harryallen.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}