Sister, I'll make a man out of you

In Sarah Roche-Mahdi's translation of Silence, we witness the heated arguments between Nature and Nurture over how Silence should conduct herself, as either a man or a woman.  While it is clear Nurture has developed Silence into becoming a very rough, strong "man", Silence still struggles with her identity throughout the story and by the end, is forcibly reverted into becoming female and thus giving the victory to Nature.  Throughout the story, I noticed some strong parallels (and divergencies) with Silence to everyone's favorite Savior of China, Fa Mulan.  Like Silence, Mulan is forced to hide her true gender and disguise herself as a man and undergo training that is thought to be too rough for women and reserved only for men.  While Silence's main reason for hiding her sex is to bypass the inheritance laws against women, later it becomes apparent to her that if she were to reveal herself, it would make her father be seen as a dishonorable man.  Mulan is also aware that if her identity were to be discovered, it would not only bring dishonor to her family but it would also be grounds for execution.  So both protagonists undergo training to develop masculine skills, which they manage to do with extraordinary success.

Both Silence and Mulan become outstanding warriors, surpassing the skills of the men around them.  While training, neither Silence nor Mulan's (Ping's) gender is ever questioned by their peers, despite Nature making Silence into a beautiful woman and Mulan having feminine characteristics as well (only cutting her hair and deepening her voice as to appear masculine). This tells me that during their respective time periods, it was so ridiculously out of the question that women have the capability of developing strong, physical skills that them being anything but a man would be ludicrous.  Both protagonists are shaped by Nurture into developing the skills necessary in order to be perceived as masculine. However, unlike Silence, Mulan never has an identity crisis pertaining to her gender. Mulan wholeheartedly identifies as a woman, unlike Silence who (due to being raised since birth as a boy) is conflicted with her identity. Mulan's inner conflict is that she is not performing her gender role correctly and thus being shamed by society for it.  She screws up every lesson in training to become a "proper wife", yet finds peace in developing her strength in fighting.  Similarily, Silence discovers that since she was brought up learning only masculine skills, that she would be shamed by society if she came out as a woman without knowing any skills of the role.  Yet Silence decides to learn to play the viele and becomes a minstrel, giving Silence a safety net to fall back on, unlike Mulan who drops the idea of becoming a "proper woman" entirely.












At the closing of both stories, both Mulan and Silence are wed to men as their genders are revealed.  Mulan, who is comfortable with her gender, happily weds General Shang while maintaining her "masculine" skills of a warrior. Silence, on the other hand, is practically forced into a marriage with the King and all the work of Nurture becomes unravelled as Nature makes Silence's physical traits feminine again.  For Mulan, Nurture seems to come out ahead of Nature, while Nature wins over Silence.  We cannot with certainty say which future came out for the better despite the similar outcomes, but we do know that both protagonists were able to outperform their male counterparts suggesting there is much more to defending an entire country than what's in your pants.