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Analysis Of Whale Rider

Decent Essays

In the film “Whale Rider”, we explore the traditions of the Maori tribe located in New Zealand. This tribe holds their traditions very high and only direct descendants of the Whale Rider himself can become the chief of the tribe. The main character in the film is a twelve-year-old girl named Paikea. Her twin brother died during childbirth, leaving Paikea as the only child. Because Paikea is a girl, she cannot be the leader of the tribe. Since there is no one in his family to become the next leader of the tribe, Paikea’s grandfather, Koro, is very upset about the death of his only male grandchild and becomes worried about the tribe’s future after he is gone. Paikea is caught in the middle of this and desperately wants to be included in the …show more content…

However, Paikea was not allowed to sit in on these classes and was always watching from the side. She was even better at learning the cultural skills than any of the boys attending the classes. She kept sneaking around the school, teaching herself the tribe’s songs and everything else that Koro was teaching the boys. Paikea wanted to be included and accepted, but Koro always believed that only males can be the leaders and kept ignoring Paikea’s attempts to be a part of the class. Sometimes Koro even got very upset with Paikea, saying, “You don’t mess around with sacred things!”, thinking that she is just doing so to be rebellious, and certainly disrespectful of the traditional patriarchy. To convince her grandfather that she can do everything the boys can, she took action to prove herself. One of these times the boys had to swim after a whale’s tooth (symbolic of tribal leadership) that Koro had thrown into the deep water. None of the boys could bring the tooth back and that is when Koro realized that he might have lost the tooth that had been passed down to him forever. After hearing of this, Paikea decided to dive into the deep water and get the tooth herself, “I’ll get it”, Paikea said, and to everyone’s surprise, she succeeded. This just shows that this little girl can participate and keep up with Koro’s challenges. Paikea also has a way of communicating with the whales in the deep, dark ocean, much like

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