Wilderness: Origins and Evolution of the Concept

The movie Avatar begins with showing the skyline of the Eywa’s planet to the treetops. In the movie, the Master Narrative of Avatar is that a planet so connected to itself and the life on it that Eywa, a narrative self, brings all living creatures, civilized, wild, and savage alike, together to preserve itself from the humans that have an Anthropocentrism mentality. The purpose for the Avatar Program (mission to Pandora) is to persuade the Na’vi the native tribe, to move away from the Unobtainium ore deposits so they can gather these resources for their personal human need. However, not everyone realized that the Na’vi, worship all of the natural resources that their world has to provide.

The company that sent the humans were led by base commander Parker Selfridge and the military commander Colonel Miles Quaritch, which had a dualism approach to the mission in that they believed that the humans were inferior to the Avatars and were going to take the minerals Unobtainium, (a Paradigm for humans as a potent source of energy that sells for millions a kilogram) that can bring cheap power back to a dying Earth from the land, at any cost. The Organic Worldview/Holism of Pandora (the planet that the Avatars lived on) is Eywa. Jake Sully and Dr. Grace Augustine were taught the Romanticism of Pandora by Neytiri (a female Avatar of the Na’vi tribe that Jake met on his first trip to the Frontier of the Avatar people and the wilderness of the Avatar) and the Na’vi people. After the trip Jake Sully has an abundance of information to say about Pandora. He explains the importance of the “Home Tree”. Home Tree sits on a major supply of Unobtainium; however Jake Sully’s time for the mission to get the resources are running out. His only choices are to convince the Na’vi to move in the next three months, or the Colonel will take matters into his own hands.

Soon enough several months pass by, and it shows that Jake is starting to change as the more he gets experience as an Avatar in the Pandora world. As a result to this the Colonel tells him that his tour is up, and he will be returning back to Earth that very same day, and he tried to give him an incentive by telling him that he will be getting his legs fixed when he returns. However, he objects to being shipped out and wants to delay his departure because he says that he is so close to being accepted into the Na’vi tribe. The Colonel lets him return but felt as if he didn’t get the task done fast enough, so he took things into his own hands and went with soldiers to get the job done himself. As a result of the learning process, Jake realized that what the company was doing was brutal and selfish thus ultimately becoming an Avatar at the Sublime Tree of Life after Eywa called out to all living things to conquer the humans.

In Wilderness: Origins and Evolution of the Concept, Alan Wilson, explains that when society believes that they are improving/developing nature, which the way the Avatar Program scientist and military viewed the mission to Pandora, isn’t always the right decision. While the humans invaded the Na’vi’s land and destroyed their “Home Tree” for Unobtainium ore deposits to get rich. It showed that the Colonel and Parker Selfridge did not realize how one tree could have such an intrinsic value, and that it can bring a civilization together in a time need.








Alan Wilson, states, “Aldo Leopold, founder of the Wilderness Society, explicitly inverts the former utilitarian belief that society invests nature with value by ‘improving’ and ‘developing’ it, arguing instead that “the raw wilderness gives definition and meaning to the human enterprise.” Similarly, the natural world used to be seen as the servant of civilized society, now it has been elevated by some to a position of mastery. The land should again be given the freedom to be ’self willed’.”


This quote sums up by saying that the Humans and Military didn’t think about the Nav’i’s when they were trying to gather the Unobtainium ore deposits for their personal needs. Never once did they think twice about the Worldview for them, and destroying another civilization and thinking that it couldn’t affect them in some kind of way.