27: A COMPARATIVE FILM ANALYSIS OF INDIGENOUS ECO-CRITICAL ETHICS AND COSMOLOGIES IN AVATAR AND MIKOLO

This paper comparatively analyses indigenous eco-critical ethics and cosmologies in James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) and Niyi Akinmolayan’s Mikolo (2023). It examines how the films construct relationships among humans, non-human beings, community and the natural environment, and how those relationships carry ideas about responsibility, belonging, coexistence and the moral status of nature. The study employs qualitative comparative textual analysis, supported by scholarship on Indigenous Knowledge Systems, ecocriticism and Performance Studies, as well as relevant production materials. Richard Schechner’s Performance Theory is used alongside an eco-critical reading to examine how ecological values become visible through behaviour, narrative action, space and digital imagery. The study finds that both films present ecological knowledge as experiential and relational, while their cosmologies position humans within wider networks of life. It further finds that digital technology can intensify such representations without guaranteeing cultural authenticity. The paper recommends a culture-first model of digital filmmaking in which technological choices remain accountable to cultural research, ecological ethics and human creative judgement.