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Footnoting Disney: Mulan

3/21/2020

2 Comments

 
Apple   | Audible |  Spotify  |  RSS  |  YouTube (captioned)
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Li Dandan as Mulan on horseback in Mulan congjun (Mulan Joins the Army) (Minxin, 1928)
Mulan is a story without a single historical precedent. From a medieval ballad to early modern narratives to plays and operas, it’s been told over and over again. Mulan’s exploits are always presented as having happened “once upon a time,” anytime from the Han dynasty to the early Tang period. These stories about a fierce heroine and her loyalties tell us a lot about changing ideas of gender and cultural identity in China.

Podcaster: Lucy
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Further Reading

Lan Dong, Mulan's Legend and Legacy in China and the United States, Temple University Press, (2011).
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Hans H. Frankel, The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady: Interpretations of Chinese Poetry, Yale University Press, (1976).

Chang-Tai Hung, "Female Symbols of Resistance in Chinese Wartime Spoken Drama." Modern China 15 (1989): 149-77.

​Shiamin Kwa and Wilt L. Idema, ed. and trans., Mulan: Five Versions of a Classic Chinese Legend, with Related Texts, Hackett, (2010).

​Feng Lan, "The Female Individual and the Empire: A Historicist Approach to Mulan and Kingston's Woman Warrior."
Comparative Literature 55 (2003): 229-45.

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Related Content

This episode is part of our Footnoting Disney Series.

Mulan, Disney, (1998).

Mulan, Disney, (2020).


Music: "Evening Melodrama" by Kevin Macleod (www.incompetech.com)
2 Comments
Catherine Tang
3/21/2020 03:26:00 am

AHHHH!!! All i said is well done Lucy for that fascinating exploration of the Ballad of Mulan. Mulan is one of my favourite Disney films and how you explored the political and visual history of it is just perfect.

BTW if you want an interesting exploration about gender, there is a Chinese film called "Farewell my Concubine" which is a tearjerker and it has segments based on a famous Chinese opera "The Hegemon-King Bids Farewell to His Concubine"

Reply
Lucy
3/31/2020 05:21:13 pm

Thank you so much -- and thanks for the film recommendation!

Reply



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