Cultural Anatomy: Water Tribe Boats Pt. 1
Hold on tight, because this is going to be a monster of a post.
The boat that Sokka and Katara were on before finding Aang is called an umiak or anyak. Umiak are traditional Inuit/Inupiat and Yupik open skin boats that are used throughout the arctic, from Siberia to Greenland. Here’s a short description of the traditional umiak-making process:
A traditional umiak begins with a frame built from driftwood, whalebone, or a combination of both. The frame is pegged and tied together with sinew, and skin from a walrus or seal is stretched over it. Most umiak require multiple skins to be sewn together to create the boat’s buoyant exterior. Oil is added on to coat and waterproof the seams. Finally, the newly skinned and oiled umiak is placed out into the wind and cold to dry.
These details all match up perfectly with what we see of Sokka and Katara’s boat. For example, their vessel clearly uses a combination of bone and wood in its framework. The “spine” of the frame clearly uses some sort of bone— if I had to guess, I’d say it’s a part of a whale’s jawbone— while the ribbing, rim, and seats of the umiak are made of wood. You’ll also notice that there’s plentiful roping and tying on the boat (around the bone, along the rim of the boat, on the seat planks, etc.), as traditional umiaks are not put together using nails or bolts.
The meta of them hunting using an umiak is also interesting as well. In many Inuit cultures, primarily those residing in the Eastern Arctic (northeast Canada), the umiak is considered “a woman’s boat”. As the umiak was rarely used for fishing, its main purpose was to provide transportation for women and children, while the men primarily used kayaks. When a man was on board of an umiak, he was generally expected to do the steering.
When we first meet Sokka and Katara, they’re trying to spear fish aboard an umiak. This is not a traditional hunting arrangement. Under normal circumstances, Sokka would be hunting in a sleek and agile kayak alongside the men of his village. So where did the kayaks go? They were probably all taken by the men for the war effort. In turn, Sokka is forced to improvise and learn to hunt with neither the proper tools nor guidance; which builds on Avatar’s recurring theme of war forcing children to essentially raise themselves with less-than-stellar results.
Similarly, when the siblings run into some ice floes, Sokka is the one prepared to steer the boat by positioning himself at the front. He tries his best to guide the boat as his father would, but it really is unreasonable to expect an unsupervised 15-year-old to steer a boat with a passenger around such sharp turns.
The umiak being considered a “woman’s boat” also explains why Sokka even brought Katara fishing with him in the first place, despite his rather narrow idea of “women’s work”. It’s very likely that the umiak was sewn together by Katara and Gran-Gran to help transport the village’s women and children, meaning that Sokka was essentially borrowing Katara’s boat. It would also explain why the decorations on the boat look like designs Katara would think to put on it; the purple waves on the boat match the design on the front of Katara’s parka and the crescent moon is obviously in reference to her waterbending.
This also provides even more reason for Katara to be angry at him after his “leave it to a girl…” comment. Imagine your brother borrowing your car— which you designed and built with your grandmother— and then crashing it while you’re riding with him, only for him to turn around and blame it all on you!
I think anyone would be angry enough to break icebergs after that.
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