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LightEcoSage1 — Culturally Influenced Language
Published: 2010-06-28 15:24:11 +0000 UTC; Views: 1636; Favourites: 31; Downloads: 8
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BTW, Yes, I've seen the movie. And I liked it. I wouldn't care if I were the only person on the face of the planet who liked it. (Which I'm not). Anyone ever hear the saying "The plural of "opinion" is not "truth"?Made in response to the people who are upset about M. Night Shyamalan using a made-up language inspired by Chinese calligraphy instead of real Chinese calligraphy.
Beloved author Professor J. R. R. Tolkien did the same exact thing with his Middle Earth languages. Middle Earth was inspired by Medieval Europe and the languages of Middle Earth were inspired by the Runic languages of Europe.
Did anyone scream about how J. R. R. Tolkien was disrespecting European culture? No. They didn't.
Also, I consider the fact that the original show used Chinese calligraphy while the movie based on the show uses this made up language to be a moot point. The point of this argument is that using a made up language is disrespectful to the original culture. But it's only disrespectful when "The Last Airbender" does it. Every other made up language in history (from Pig Latin to little codes that children invent) are 100% okay, while this is an absolute abomination. Also, considering the fact that Mike and Bryan were rushing to get the show up and running when they first began producing it, it made more sense for them to use an existing language than to make up their own. Making up your own language takes time, time that Mike and Bryan didn't have.
I'm pretty sure that this will be my last preemptive "Anti-Racebender" piece. Because the next time I post something, it will not be along the lines of "This movie is going to be awesome", but "This movie IS awesome!"
"The Lord of the Rings" (c) Professor J. R. R. Tolkien
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Comments: 36
Wow, I didn't know that he MADE-UP a language for the Avatar-World. I guess it's fitting because having ACTUAL Chinese in the Avatar World would make no sense. There is no CHINA in the Avatar World. The writing above (if that IS the real writing) does exhibit the beauty of Chinese calligraphy. It flows and has long strokes and what not. Yeah, this isn't that big of a deal. People shouldn't be upset over this....but whatever. Their loss.
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The writing in the picture is actually from the book/movie "The Lord of the Rings".
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Ah, I see. Well, whatever the writing may be in TLA I'm sure it will resemble Chinese calligraphy in a way. But if not, not the end of the world.
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Here's a picture of the Water Bending Scroll from the movie, which has this new written language.
[link]
And, if you put this up next to an example of Chinese calligraphy and asked me to tell you which one was Chinese and which one was the made up language of TLA, I wouldn't be able to tell you.
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Wow! How cool! I love it. Looks like the real scroll.
And yes, it DOES resemble Chinese calligraphy VERY much. I don't know a LOT, but I have taken one year of Chinese. I THINK I would be able to tell them apart (the made-up and REAL Chinese) only because this language has like NO characters I recognize. Usually, when I look at something in Chinese, I can recognize a few characters. But in this, it's not even Chinese, yet has that sweet oriental feel. 
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I, on the other hand, opted for Spanish when taking my foreign language. (It's almost a must in California).
I can recognize a few Chinese words, but I can't read the calligraphy at all.
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As long as they do their homework and build a suitable made-up language, who cares it was based on chinese calligraphy? Many other fantasy/sci fi series used other languages as a guide or inspiration for their own. If it was horribly done I would understand, but so far like you said the complaining has gone beyond reason and into the "angry mob" mentality.
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Totally. And I hate angry mobs. How am I supposed to concentrate on being a crazy fangirl if they are screaming for blood all day long?
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Wait... so the racebenders are mad that they are using ASIAN influenced languages?
...that makes loads of sense.
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The argument is basically that they should have used actual Chinese calligraphy instead of "gibberish".
Either way, I don't care. Since I can't understand either Chinese calligraphy or the made-up language that the movie uses.
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I really agree with everything you said, it's a double standard. Why should it NOT be ok for TLA to have it's own made up language and TLOR be ok when they did the same thing?
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Good one! If I recalled, the Elvish languages were strongly influenced by Welsh and Finnish. Not just that, the common language spoken in Middle-Earth wasn't actually English, but a Mannish tongue known as Westron which is represented by English in the novels and movies.
Being a huge fan of Tolkien's works, I'd like to point out that he didn't just use Medieval Europe, but also took inspiration from Norse mythology and sagas, as well as Anglo-Saxon literature such as Beowulf. Not to mention his own experiences while fighting in World War I were some of the inspirations for the battles. You would find that a lot of his work mirrors some of the tales found in Poetic Edda and the Finnish epic, Kalevala. In fact, I find that Tolkien's Middle-Earth stories parallels more of the Norse and other European mythological tales as compared to Avatar, whose story is completely made up by Bryke. I didn't find any parallels with Asian literature and mythology when I watched Avatar, despite being heavily influenced by Asian cultures.
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Yea, I noticed this as well, the story of Avatar is way more fictional and has more fictional elements than the works of Tolkien.
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And I just facepalmed everytime I see Racebenders and boycotters compare TLA to LoTR, saying that if Middle-Earth can be occupied by mostly white people, therefore the Avatar world should be occupied by mostly or only Asian people. What these noobs don't know is that according to Tolkien himself in one of his letters, Middle-Earth is actually a continent set on OUR Earth, about 6000 years before our time, but in a distant past when the shape of the lands and continents are different from today. It's even stated in the Prologue of the LoTR book like this:
"Those days, the Third Age of Middle-Earth, are now long past, and the shape of all lands has been changed; but the regions in which Hobbits lived were doubtless the same as those in which they still linger: the North-West of the Old World, east of the sea."
He also mentioned in his letters that the continent of Middle-East corresponds to Europe, thus making ME somewhat a fictional ancient version of Europe. So, it makes sense that ME is inhabited by mostly white people because according to Word of God, they are actually ancient Europeans! Not just that, there are also dark-skinned people down South of ME, such as the Haradrim (the ones with the Oliphaunts), although they are on the side of Sauron, which tend to cause some unfortunate implications. But people tend to forget that these men aren't really evil to begin with, they were just seduced and corrupted into darkness, similarly to the mighty Numenoreans back in the Second Age. There are even other lands and continents apart from Middle-earth which are mentioned, but are largely left unexplored by Tolkien.
As for A:TLA, it's set in a fictional place NOT on our Earth, and its map encompasses an entire world! Therefore unlike Middle-Earth, it doesn't make sense to have an all-Asian cast because it is not set in only one part of the world like LoTR. I think what M Night did is actually quite clever, it reflects the various ethnic groups and diversity of our own world yet is also unique in its own way.
To summarise this, LoTR is actually set in our world, whereas Avatar is not, so therefore they can cast whoever they want for the TLA because their "races" in their world are not the same as ours.
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Hmm, so LOTR is actually historically correct, in a sense. Boy does this prove lots of boycotters' points wrong.
Interesting...I don't really know that much about LoTR, thanks for informing me on this as well. This also proves lots of boycotters' points wrong.
Bingo! This is so true, if only these boycotters stop thinking it's Earth and start to realize that it's actually a fatasy world BASED on Earthly aspects. M. Night made the perfect choice. It would seem unrealistic for the whole cast to be primarily consisting of Asian people, since people evolve and diversify in every worldy environments.
Exactly, that is what I keep saying about TLA.
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The same goes for the Prince of Persia movie. People are criticizing it for being white-washed, but according to Reza Aslan, an Iranian who runs a consultation and niche marketing firm specializing in creative content about the Middle East, it's actually historically correct. Persians back in those days during PoP were actually Aryans, a lot of them even had blonde hair and blue eyes. That was before the Turks invaded Persia and changed everything.
It just sometimes amuses me when certain people never do their research before jumping to conclusions and making such a huge deal out of something so minor and trivial.
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Yea, I have read into Persia's true history and discovered this as well. Leave it up to the Turks to try taking over other lands, just like they did with Greece for 400 years or tried doing with Cyprus 50 years ago (lol this is a joke btw, I don't have anything against Turks these days, especially modernized ones. But what I said about Turks taking over Greece and Cyprus is correct unfortunately 
Yea, same here
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The only parallel that I can find with Avatar and Asian culture is the Avatar and the Dali Lama. Both are in a cycle of reincarnation, both are discovered in similar ways, and both are spiritual leaders.
But other than that, I think that's it. And that's something that the movie didn't mess with. (Given all the info we know about it.)
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Oh yeah! Forgot about the Dalai Lama thing. Hehe! Silly me.
Sigh! Even there are some aspects of my own culture which I can be clueless about. Heck I'm more familiar with British culture and history more so than my own Chinese ones! It's funny cause I myself have come across many people who accuse other people of being ignorant of other cultures being unknowingly ignorant themselves, especially towards their own culture.
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I have run across those type of people too, AND have dealt with that kind of accusation myself. They're probably saying that because they ran out of reasonable things to say in their counter messages.
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I would be the last person to claim that I'm a cultural expert. I have a pretty general knowledge of most cultures, but I'm not an expert in them.
But, I still respect those cultures, and enjoy the good things that come out of them. Especially the food. I just love ethnic food.
The great thing about the USA is that it's such a mixing pot of culture, and everyone is able to enjoy the celebrations of that culture.
And that's exactly how I see "The Last Airbender". As an American celebration of world culture.
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Me too! You're so right about TLA being like America in a sense that it has ethnic diversity
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"And that's exactly how I see "The Last Airbender". As an American celebration of world culture."
Yeah. I wonder why Racebenders can't seem to catch that one. But I guess it's understandable to a degree why certain people would be upset, because most Asians are the type who have this close bond and association to their own culture, up till a point that if it gets borrowed or "butchered" by non-Asians, they see it as an offense or some form of cultural appropriation. Heck, even mixing Chinese and Japanese cultures together is kind of an offense to some Chinese, due to what happened during World War II when the Japanese invaded China. It's funny that no one made a huge fuss when it is obvious in the cartoon that they mashed Japanese and Chinese cultures to create the Fire Nation.
Sad to say that I personally feel that this is a very biased double-standard. I mean, if you have watched anime from Japan, you'd find that the Japanese borrow a lot of aspects from Western culture and twist it so that it's appropriate to the Japanese audience. No one seem to make a big fuss about that, yet when it's the opposite, it's considered "offensive".
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The boycotters just dismiss the obvious diversity in the movie as "being a cover up for a whitewashed main cast". I also noticed that Asian people seem to be more close with their cultures than other type of ethnic people with their own.
"Sad to say that I personally feel that this is a very biased double-standard. I mean, if you have watched anime from Japan, you'd find that the Japanese borrow a lot of aspects from Western culture and twist it so that it's appropriate to the Japanese audience. No one seem to make a big fuss about that, yet when it's the opposite, it's considered "offensive"."
It IS a biased double standard, and I say it all the time when talking to boycotters. They should really get to know more about anime, because it seems like they know pretty little to nothing at all.
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Don't you just hate double standards? I know that I do.
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Yeah! Really? If every body and their grandmother can make up a made-up language, why isn't The Last Airbender allowed to? GRR! It makes me so mad!!!
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Ecausebay eoplepay reay tupidsay.
Pig Latin for Because people are stupid.
God, I love Pig Latin.
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Esyay eoplepay reay eallyray eallyray tupidsay
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Ouyay otgay hattay ightray!
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ahahay eapyay on'tday iay? ollay ^^-ay.
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What language was the middle earth tongue based off of? It looks a little Arabic to me.
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There's dozens of languages in Middle Earth... all of them inspired by an Earth language.
Tolkien used Old English, Norse, Icelandic, and Finnish. And the written languages were inspired by Runes, like those used by the Anglo-Saxons: [link]
The specific language on the Ring is written, according to Gandalf, in the "Black Speech of Mordor" and I can't find the specific language it's based on.
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