Gender in Ballad of Mulan and Disney’s Mulan

• In Event: Critical and feminist analyses of policy and media discourses

Proposal

Disney animated feature movie Mulan in the Western context and the poem Ballad of Mulan in the Chinese traditions both depict a Chinese warrior named Hua Mulan who takes the family responsibility to protect the state by fighting against the invading Huns. As the only child in her family, Hua Mulan takes her injury-plagued father’s position to join the army in the national war disguised as a man. This case study is an attempt to explore how gender is illustrated through the two versions of Mulan’s story that are based on Chinese traditional culture and the Western popular culture. This illustrates constructions of gender in Eastern and Western culture; and more especially, the present analysis in this paper examines that Ballad of Mulan represents how gender is affected by the Chinese patriarchal and national traditions while Disney’s Mulan highlights how gender is portrayed within a Western patriarchal and masculine ideology. Gender is always intersectional; therefore, different socio-cultural contexts in China and the West reinforce and create particular intersections of race, class, and culture.
Through comparing and contrasting Chinese traditions and culture with the Western contexts, I argue that gender implications in Ballad of Mulan and Disney’s Mulan respectively emphasize the correlative impacts of patriarchy, race, and nationalism on gender as well as the collaborative influences of patriarchy and masculinity on gender and gender diversity, which both play significant roles in Hua Mulan’s gender and cultural identity and empowerment. Those factors lead us to rethink gender and social justice through deconstructing the gendered ideologies and reconstructing possibilities based on women’s empowerment, freedom, and solidarity based on harmony in difference in contemporary China and in the Western contexts with the landscape of globalization from social justice values, which enable us to collectively fight for global social justice and sustainable development in and out of education.
Ballad of Mulan and Disney’s Mulan collectively lead us to rethink and explore a collaborative way towards global gender equity in and out of education. Can social justice pedagogy be effective ways towards gender equity for those underprivileged females and gendered communities to defend patriarchal and masculine social constructions and culture? Can the strategies decolonization and multiculturalism collaboratively advocate for gender equity towards an egalitarian society that Conversi (2008) highlights? Can gender responsive schools build gender responsive and equitable societies? In terms of achieving gender equality, it is significant to empower women and gendered communities through economic and political participation, institutional reform, as Fennell and Arnot (2008) highlights, and “citizenship rights to participation and access to services” (p.37), as David Held states (cited by Unterhalter, 2008). As Unterhalter (2008) argues, education needs to be transformational by not only providing basic knowledge but also teaching political skills for implementing social change towards gender equity. In terms of advocating for the empowerment of women and gendered communities, as educators, we need to reframe gender in schools toward gender equity and sustainable development through teaching, learning, and institutional building. All of these can practically address issues pertaining to identity, human rights, and sexuality and gender education towards global gender equity. We also need to understand “people’s freedom to achieve what they have reason to value” (Unterhalter, 2008, p. 74). Importantly, gender equality in education, as Unterhalter (2008) argues, is not “dictated morally or legally, but is a necessary condition to allow reflection on capabilities, the conversion of resources into capabilities for differently situated people and to enable the development of further capabilities” (p.81).
In terms of achieving global gender equity, collectively deconstructing those gendered ideologies based on women’s empowerment, freedom, and solidarity in North American contexts and reconstructing possibilities based on solidarity and harmony in difference towards sustainable development are both prominent with the landscape of globalization. As Fei (1992) highlights, 各美其美 (Every form of beauty has its uniqueness); 美人之美 (Precious is to appreciate other forms of beauty with openness); 美美与共 (If beauty represents itself with diversity and integrity); 天下 大同(The world will be blessed with harmony and unity). I think this statement insightfully points out a great way to practice harmony in difference and make positive changes toward global gender equity based on the understanding of the intersection of gender, race, social class, sexuality, and culture globally. If we as educators, schools, institutions, policymakers, and communities including those marginalized collaboratively fight against the gender-unjust social construction and cultural hegemony, we can lead to a big change based on women empowerment, freedom, and solidarity toward a more gender-just and inclusive society in the long run. By exploring gender in Ballad of Mulan and Disney’s Mulan, the collective implications of gender lead us to deconstruct gender inequity based on the patriarchal, national, and masculine ideology and reconstruct possibilities towards gender equity and sustainable development with the landscape of globalization.

Author

• Meng Xiao, OISE, University of Toronto