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Invisible People Documentary Analysis

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Cultural relativism is the idea that all cultures are of the same value and are equal/no one culture is above or better than another. Saying this, cultural relativists do not criticize other cultures or justify a practice as “right or wrong” but in turn try to see the culture through the eyes of the individuals within it. When conducting fieldwork, anthropologists use cultural relativism to better understand the culture without bias or judgment. To do this, anthropologists forget all preconceptions of a culture before studying and go into the work with an open mind and positive outlook.

One of the movies that best represents culture relativism would be Avatar. In this movie, the U.S military send troops to a place called Pandora, occupied …show more content…

In this movie the indigenous people, referred to as the Invisible People, took in the main character, Tommy, and raised him to be one of their own. His biological father, Bill Markham, finally found him 10 years later alongside his negatively opinionated journalist and was introduced to the Invisible People culture. During this time, Markham became ill and was nursed back to health by these indigenous people. Throughout his time there, he came to appreciate the culture his son was a part of and developed a great amount of respect for the chief. Markham also began to discover his own purpose and reveals his spirit animal. By using cultural relativism, Markham was able to set aside the comments made about the Invisible People and appreciate his son’s culture and understand it as …show more content…

John Dunbar, the main character, was a First Lieutenant in the Civil War. After his time in the war, he asks to be posted on the Western Frontier and is placed at a post named Fort Sedgewick. Here, Dunbar encounters the Sioux Indians and he soon pursues the tribe to establish rapport. When he comes into contact with the Sioux, he realizes that what he was told about the Indians was untrue. Dunbar establishes trust with the tribe and begins to adapt to their culture. He expresses much effort through attempting to learn their language, helping in the fight against the pawnee, and even fighting the U.S. military. In the end, Dunbar was able to put aside all previous knowledge of Indians and see the good in the Sioux

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