The National Museum of Qatar’s Pearling Exhibit, though very informative of the history of pearl diving and trade, does not explicitly go into depth regarding the environmental impacts of pearl fishing. Going back to the movie by Mira Nair, Nafas, it shows how the pearl divers would collect oysters from the sea bed in vast amounts to search for pearls with limited chances of success. To the “deep ecologists,” this practice of pearl fishing would be seen as the exploitative and anthropocentric actions of humans. According to Western deep ecologists, the value of nonhuman beings should not rely upon their usefulness towards humans but rather they should hold their value just for their own sake and hence nonhuman nature must be preserved and untouched (Garrard, 23). This position is challenged by Ramachandra Guha in the article, “Radical Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: A Third World Critique,” who puts forward the argument that viewing the wilderness or nature in the East from the perspective of American environmentalism is extremely problematic (Guha, 75). In the East, local populations have settled harmoniously with nature and utilize it for gaining resources such as food, water and to make a living and to take these resources away from the people would be detrimental to them (Guha, 75). The reliance of the Qatari population on the sea can be seen in the same light as pearl fishing was essential for them and a major source of food and income for the society as they used pearls to trade with the world (National Museum of Qatar, 2019). If pearl fishing was taken away from the people of Qatar, the people would have lost their food source and way of earning money which would have had negative impacts on the socioeconomic conditions of the country.
As mentioned in the previous posts, Nair’s short film depicts the harmonious nature of local population with the sea. The importance of the sea to the local population was not limited to its resources but it also shaped their perception of life. In the short film, the unnamed pearl diver leaves his wife behind to go on a pearl diving journey where he nearly drowns in the sea but is saved by the faith of his wife and hallucination of his wife swimming towards him (Nair, 07:32). As the pearl diver resurfaces the sea, a faint first cry of a newborn baby is heard in the background symbolizing the birth of the diver from the ocean and symbolizes a new life being given to him (Nair, 08:00). The significance of this scene is that it shows the importance that the people placed in the sea, how they feared the sea but also respected the sea as it provided the population with a source of income but at the same time could also be deadly. In the film, Nair this depiction of the sea as a giver and taker of life shows how the local population would view the sea as an integral part of their lives and culture. This proves a direct contrast to the belief of American environmentalism as it shows that the Qatari population did not exploit nature to fulfill their own needs but live harmoniously and sustainably with the sea.
Works Cited:
Garrard, Greg. Ecocriticism. 2nd ed. Abingdon, Oxon; Routledge, 2012.
Guha, Ramachandra. “Radical American Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: A Third World Critique”, Environmental Ethics, Vol. 11 (1), Spring 1989.
Life on the Coast. 28 March 2019 – , National Museum of Qatar, Doha.
Nafas, directed by Mira Nair, Doha Film Institute, 2014.
