“I’ll make a man out of you”

By: neisha williams

“Look at me, I will never pass for a perfect bride, or a perfect daughter. Can it be, I'm not meant to play this part?” This is a quote from when the first Asian Disney Princess Mulan is singing a song about her struggle with wanting to show people the real her instead of what everyone wants her to be. Even though she wants to show this side of her she is scared of disappointing her family. The movie was released in 1998 during the Disney renaissance which was between 1989 starting with the little mermaid and ending in 1999 with Tarzan. The movie follows Hua Mulan as she tries to figure out who she is in her place in her family and where she fits into society. At the beginning of the movie she is trying to fit into her cultural norms and family expectations of her as she partakes in the matchmaking process. But then a little later her villege learns that the Hans have invaded China and a man from every family must serve in the Imperial Army. Her weak elderly father was the only man in her family so he was forced to go even after her pleas for him not to. When she realizes that her father is serious about going to fight she decides to take his army, disguise as a man and go in his place. During her time training and being actively in the war learns how to be strategic and resourceful with her movements because she is fighting men that are bigger than her. This ultimately leads to her being the key reason why China beat the Hun Army. Mulan as a character is a courageous opinionated hero while also being pensive and modest. The Disney Princess Mulan is an important and complex Third Wave feminist character due to the fact that she both breaks cultural gender norms and while also upholding them.

CONFORMING TO THEM:

When people think of Mulan they think of how she dressed up as a man to infiltrate the Imperial Army, something that isn’t seen as “lady-like” but that is not the only thing that there is about her. She also took part in the traditional custom of going through the matchmaking process that was expected of women. She did this because she thought it was what she was supposed to do so she could fit into society and because she didn’t want to bring dishonor to her family. According to Brocklebank “The painting of a feminine face/mask and the donning of a decorative costume transform Mulan into “a perfect porcelain doll”. Such a transformation emphasizes the artificial nature of those rituals associated with “womanhood” and points to gender itself as a construction and creation, one which often fails to mirror reality as Mulan realizes when gazing at her painted image in the river, she wonders: “When will my reflection show who I am inside”.” The whole point of the matchmaking process is to make the girls in the village as “desirable” as possible so they can marry a man and bear their sons. The women who were in the matchmaking process with Mulan had their face make-up basically the same, outfits are very similar and are supposed to have identical demeanors that were considered “womanly”. This made it so all of the women were the same and didn’t showcase their own individual personalities. Mulan even glances over at the other girls who seemed more trained in it to see what the correct way of doing it was. This wasn’t who Mulan was and even she knew that, she was doing it so she could appease her family and not disappoint them. But in the end when she didn’t make a good impression with the matchmaker she felt as though she disappointed her family, essentially her father whom she wanted to make proud the most.

Throughout the movie Mulan seeks out the need to make her authority figures proud, a sense to prove herself worthy. The first person ever being her father. According to the evolution of Disney Princesses and Its Impact on Young Girls “Other mid-to-late princess movies also emphasize a happy ending that the princesses gain their father's approval, such as Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Mulan. It still represents the need for women to be validated by a patriarchal culture. (Jin)”. In the beginning of the movie Mulan seeks the approval of her father when she goes through the matchmaker process to find a husband and bear a son. Then at the end of the movie, after she played a vital role in defeating the Huns, she was praised by the emperor and he gave her his crest and Shan Yu’s sword. The first thing that she does when she returns home is bow down to her father and present them to him as a way to show honor to her family. Her father then gives her a big hug and says “The greatest gift and honor is having you for a daughter”, and then she breaks down crying. Even though one of the main reasons she went to fight in the war was to save her father, an underlying reason was to show that she could make the people in her life proud and that she could do things right.

At the climax of the film the Hun army finds the Imperial Army and charges at them, the Imperial Army tries everything and it doesn’t even put a dent in the Huns. As they are running out of supplies Mulan takes the last cannon and runs to shoot at a snowy mountain thus creating an avalanche. While doing this she comes face to face with Shan Yu and he slashes her after he realizes what she does. The avalanche wiped out most of the Hun army, saving the day.  After the  commotion Mulan faints due to blood loss from Shan Yu’s attack when she wakes up everyone learns that she is a woman. As stated in the text American Mulan: Powerful and powerless “After Mulan’s identity was revealed, she was supposed to be sentenced to death. And the attitude toward her changed abruptly. A miniature before, she was the hero who saved the whole army; a minute later she became a “treacherous snake”, committed “high treason”, and accused of “ultimate dishonor”.” When it should’ve been a time of honoring her she was instead shunned by the very people she saved. Although her life was spared it wouldn’t even be a question if she was a man. If it was a man who came up with what Mulan did he would be called an intelligent hero; they wouldn’t be contemplating if he should die. It enforces the stereotype that women are not and should not be capable of accomplishing things that are “just for men”.

CHALLENGING THEM:

Although Mulan conforms to cultural gender norms at the same time she breaks them. Mulan steals her fathers armor to join the army in his place in the army, after struggling excels in basic training, and is the reason why the Imperial Army. Mentioned in the text ’You the man, well, sorta’: Gender binaries and liminality in Mulan. Diversity in Disney films: Critical essays on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and disability “the Wu Shu camp functions on two levels: training new recruits to be soldiers as well as training Mulan to be a man. If “wife” is the cultural artifact for “women” in the film the “soldier” is the cultural artifact of man”. While in the beginning of the movie she was trying to be the “wife” she ended up being the “soldier”. The movie depicted how seperate the genders were from the start of the movie demming one was better than the other. Mulan helped break that separation through her work in the army, showing that she was just as capable. She was a “girl boss”. According to Girlhood. In D. T. Cook (Ed.), The SAGE encyclopedia of children and childhood studies “Girlhood in the form of girl power is often a resilient, independent category that rejects vulnerability in favor of a heteronormative masculine individualism and self-sufficiency.” Mulan goes from wanting to make her family proud through following the social expectations to still wanting to make her family proud but through her own means instead. Through basic training she became physically stronger and more confident in her strategic ability. These abilities are what helped wipe out the Huns on the mountains and also defeat Shan Yu at the emperor's palace. Even after her gender was revealed and everyone turned her back on her, after no one believed her when she was telling everyone that the Huns were alive she still stood strong and helped them defeat them.

 Mulan was brought up to believe that she must marry a man and bear a son in order to bring honor to her family. They believed that every girl is and should be that way. According to Girlhood studies.  In D. T. Cook(Ed.), The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies “A key contribution from feminist poststructuralist thinking is the idea that gender is not something that children have, but something that they do, or perform, within powerful discursive structures that may enable or constrain children’s various gender identities.”(Kustatscher 2022 p.3). Mulan proves that she doesn’t have but does gender through the fact that she had the viewpoint of both a woman and man. A woman when she was in the matchmaking process, after and was revealed and everything after that. But she was also in the viewpoint of a man when she dressed up as a man and trained with the men.

Mulan was not seen as the ideal girl. She is seen as a failure and clumsy in the eyes of the matchmaker. According to The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies. SAGE Publications. “the process of girling for non-ideal girls remains fraught and often disempowering, as new kinds of social power for girls are tethered to age-old exclusions (e.g., racism, hetero-sexism, ableism) that marginalize, criminalize, and disproportionately institutionalize other bodies and desires.” (Gonick). Mulan in the eyes of the matchmaker did not fit what it was in their culture to be a woman. With Mulan not being fit she would never bring honor, they most likely would have the shame with that dishonor. But Mulan brought honor to her family in a different way that women in her culture couldn’t. Her saving China brought the honor to her family that they would have never gotten if she didn’t go.

GIRL CULTURE SIGNIFICANCE:

Mulan is a significant and inspiring figure for young girls. She demonstrates to them that they don’t have to be what people expect and just be who they want to be no matter what others think. It’s important that people know about Mulan in a more in depth way because there is more to her than meets the eye. The movie makes it so both conservatives and liberals can enjoy it. Conservative have the more traditional parts where Mulan takes part in her culture's customs and falls in love. And the liberals have a girl's boss. resilient, independent version of her. Mulan helps people open our minds to different possibilities of what a girl can be. If we don’t open our minds to understanding different cultures we won’t see the whole person because it allows us to see other people for who they are and not if they fit into a set of rules that were established. Mulan can be used as an example of both sides of what it is to be a girl if not more. She is a flexible character that part takes in both what is stereotypical for a girl and what isn’t. She can make it so they can talk about different topics while using a familiar character that everyone knows and loves. She also provides representation for young Asian girls due to the fact that Mulan is Chinese, making her the first Asian Disney Princess. This can inspire young Asian American girls that they are able to be what Mulan is because she looks like them. While Mulan emphasizes her more ambiguous and leader side she teaches girls that not all you are. You can be both a leader and more feminine as shown through the fact that even though she is an ambiguous leader she found love in Li Shang in the end.

In conclusion Mulan is not just a girl who stole her fathers armor and ran away to join the army. Mulan is a complex Third Wave feminist character because she not only challenges her cultural gender norms but she upholds them. She was just a girl who at the beginning wanted to make her family, mostly her father proud but ended up becoming so much more. She became the girl who saved all of China using her brains not her brawn when everyone doubted her just because she was a girl. When no one listened to her when she said they were still alive just for those same people to bow to her out of respect when she won. But through all of that she also fell in love with a man who loves all parts of her. He loves the driven leader that Mulan is while also the Mulan that wants to make the people around her proud and happy. And is who Mulan truly is.

Works Cited

Brocklebank, Lisa. (2000.). Disney's Mulan—the “True” Deconstructive Heroine?. Wayne State University Press. (p. 1-17)

Jin, Z. (2023, October). Evolution of Disney Princesses and Its Impact on Young Girls. In 2023 7th International Seminar on Education, Management and Social Sciences (ISEMSS 2023) (pp. 546-555). Atlantis Press.

Gengcheng, Z. American Mulan: Powerful and Powerless.

Gonick, Marnina. (2020). The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies. SAGE Publications.(pp. 852-855)

Helgren, J. (2020). Girlhood. In D. T. Cook (Ed.), The SAGE encyclopedia of children and childhood studies (pp. 842–845). SAGE Publications.

Kustacher, M. (2020).  Girlhood studies.  In D. T. Cook(Ed.), The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies (p. 846). SAGE Reference.

Limbach, G. (2013). ’You the man, well, sorta’: Gender binaries and liminality in Mulan.

Diversity in Disney films: Critical essays on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and disability, 115-128.