fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #772 ]

⌈ Secret Post #772 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog]

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[Weiss Kreuz]

Notes:

Might be some repeats from when LJ crashed thkgjhf

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

How is Mulan "androgynous"?
She is a young woman who finds the prescribed, gender-defined expectations her society holds for her, and its conception of womanhood, to be stifling and undesirable. She is a young woman who successfully bucks convention and cross-dresses in the pursuit of doing so, but she hardly lives as an androgynous, gender-neutral figure in her society.

Admirable, positive, and affirming of female choice as Mulan's actions are, she is not a gender-bending icon. Nor does she need to be in order to be awesome.

Mulan is one of my favorite movies, and that's partly for personal reasons.

As I see it, one of the central themes of the film is her search for an identity that's comfortable, specifically in terms of gender. As you said, she finds her society's expectations of femininity to be stifling and undesirable. Likewise, while she achieves no small amount of success and forms close, important friendships while playing the part of a man, that skin isn't one she's entirely comfortable in either. It isn't until the end of the film, when she finds a compromise between masculinity and femininity, that she can feel real satisfaction and contentment with who she is -- who she's chosen to be, not the matchmaker's perfect bride nor Li Shang's perfect soldier, but somewhere in between.

When I say "androgynous" this is really what I mean -- her refusal to bend to either of these sets of gender expectations. It's a story that's resonated with me very strongly and helped me form my own personal identity as a not-particularly-girly girl.

Mulan is one of my absolute favorite characters ever, animated or otherwise. Not because she's an icon of any sort, but because she's so very much herself.

That said, I'm admittedly confused why you felt like you needed to make this comment anonymously?

(Not the original anon, but I thought I'd chime in - I'm doing it anonymously b/c I don't want to upset anyone :( )

I think that, while androgynous is a word that technically fits, the connotation of is a little different that what you're trying to convey. I think most people tend to associate it with not being able to "figure out" which gender a person is, or a kind of sexual ambiguity, where they just don't fit either masculine or feminine. I personally separate that from the "mix of masculine and feminine characteristics" definition, myself...I think that a lot of people (wrongly) hear "androgynous" and think "asexual" or something like that, maybe?

I don't know if this comment makes any sense. :( It did before I started writing it. Gah.

I don't think you need to be anonymous -- you're just explaining your thoughts on the word androgyny, which you know, is a perfectly fine thing to do! <3

I think your reading of the film is as valid an interpretation as I've ever seen, and of course, would be on a personal level for you no matter what my admittedly anonymous opinion. It remains anonymous for precisely the reason given by the commenter below me - I'm not looking for trouble, I simply wanted to leave an unencumbered comment. :)

On to business. My issue with your insistence on Mulan's androgyny lies in this - Mulan is a young woman. She is not subject to some form of gender dysphoria, she simply isn't invested in her society's notion of what it is to be female. She has her own notion of what it is to be female - and her path to that revelation includes straying from strict gender binary-based expectations. But she is still a young woman, and identifies as one. Mulan is a non-traditional, uppity female, but she identifies as a female still and has no issue with her femaleness apart from its use as a reason to keep her at home, with all that entails. The compromise she finds has, I believe, more to do with the notion of "being herself" than her having bridged or conquered the idea of gender binary dictated behavior.

I suppose at the root of it, I don't feel that "androgyny" can be expressed as "not particularly girly". Not being girly is simply one expression of femaleness. Being girly is another. Being somewhere in between is another still. There is no way in which someone who identifies as a woman is not womanly. However she is doing it, she is doing it right.

Just my two cents, I suppose! Thanks for your time and thoughts.

an⋅drog⋅y⋅nous
–adjective
1. being both male and female; hermaphroditic.
2. having both masculine and feminine characteristics.
3. having an ambiguous sexual identity.
4. neither clearly masculine nor clearly feminine in appearance: the androgynous look of many rock stars.

I think Mulan can easily be considered androgynous by the 2nd and 4th definitions. But that's just me. :\

[ SECRET POST #772 ]

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Re: 130 (LOL I CAN USE DICTIONARY.COM. GO ME.)