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Vincent Lee
English 115
Professor Jon Beadle
October 4th, 2015
Ms. Marvel vs Gender Expectations
Societys views holds the world back from becoming equal. In the comic, Ms. Marvel,
issues 1 to 5 written by G. Willow Wilson, the protagonist, Kamala Khan, is a normal teenage
girl born into a Pakistani immigrant family. She was granted superpowers from her ideal and
perfect woman, Captain Marvel. Her powers allowed her to shape shift her body, heal from any
wounds, and transform into her ideal woman which gives her a reason to break social norms.
Kamala faces many social pressures in her life especially when her parents are Muslims. Since
she is a girl, she cant go out late, her parents dont trust her with boys, she has strict curfews,
and many more restrictions, but even then, she still rebels against them. She also faces other
social pressures, like being the perfect woman and having the men do the dirty work instead of
having her do it herself. Kamalas definition of a perfect women is Captain Marvel; blonde hair,
beautiful, less complicated, and wear a politically incorrect costume. Like what Lorber said
in Night to His Day: The Social Construction of Gender, gender is used to separate one
another in a hierarchy, although women are slowly becoming more equal to men as seen in the
workforce where they are working the same jobs as the men. In From Women, Men, and
Society, written by Claire Renzetti and Daniel Curran, they both talk about gender issues that
relate to Kamalas situations that she faces, like how women are expected to be well behaved and
do the domestic jobs in the household and the men should protect the woman. However, with

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Kamalas newly obtained power, she gained the motivation to break out of that social bubble and
transgressed from social norms.
To start off, Kamalas powers motivated her to be even more rebellious to her parents and
culture than before she had them. On page seven of Ms. Marvel, Kamala had an argument with
her father about going out to a party. She argued Brunos a boy. If I was a boy, youd let me go
to the party and he became upset because it was true that the only reason she couldnt go out
was because she was a girl and she was being disrespectful. Her disobedience is looked down
upon in her household because of her parents conservative views on family life, especially when
they are religious immigrants. As Lorber said in her Night to his Day: The Social
Construction of Gender, gender is used to separate one another in a hierarchy, in this case, its
family and religion thats the hierarchy where the men are always superior over the women and
this places her at the bottom of the hierarchy (21), where she barley has any say in what she can
do. Today, most fathers are overprotective of their daughters and women are expected to listen to
their parents. When she came back from the party, on page 41, we see that Kamala became
determined to protect people, especially the ones close to her, even if it meant disobeying her
parents even more. We can safely assume that before the party, Kamala was an obedient daughter
since her father said Tell me why my precious Kamala has suddenly become a reckless,
disobedient girl I barely recognize? on page 39 and the fact that her friends didnt expect her to
be at the party in the first place because of her parents restrictions. With her new powers, she has
a logical reason to break family and cultural norms. On page 47, we see that Kamala and her
friend, Nakia, interrupted Sheikh Abdullahs lecture in the Mosque and left completely to talk
about her powers, showing complete disrespect and selfishness to everyone in the lecture and not
following the expected gender norms. Kamala is not passionate about her culture and religion

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and she only wants to do things her own way. She wants to be a strong independent woman, but
her family beliefs hold her back.
Secondly, Kamala also acts more like herself rather than what society sees as the perfect
girl. Kamala always wanted to be as close to perfect as she could until after she got her
powers. During her interaction with the other Marvel heroes, she said that she wanted to be
beautiful and awesome and butt-kicking and less complicated and wear the classic, politically
incorrect costume and kick butt in giant wedge heels on page 17. She wanted to be the girl that
she saw as perfect, in which society shaped that viewpoint for her. After she was given those
attributes, she said Is it too late to change my mind? on page 20 and she started to complain
about the costume and how it made her feel uncomfortable. During the second time that she
changed into her ideal woman form, she covered herself up by wearing pants. Later on page 29,
when she transformed for the third time, we see that she changed her outfit completely and did
not transform into her ideal woman. Instead of the outfit that was given to her, she wore her own
costume which consisted of a purple shirt over a long sleeve red shirt and red pants. She was
more comfortable and proud of dressing and looking like herself, rather than a sexualized object
that society sees as a perfect woman. She added a lightning bolt to her outfit and wore gold
cuffs to on page 97. This shows that Kamala created her own superhero identity. She performed
better when she dressed up as herself and had more advantages when she was in her normal
form, like her instant healing power when she went back to her normal form after her second
transformation during the shoplifting scene. People in society today make their life harder to
meet gender expectations, like wearing tight clothing to look attractive even when it restricts
their movement like what Renzetti and Curran said in Women, Men, and Society (77). Kamala

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didnt want to make her conflicts harder for the looks, so she just decided to look like herself. As
a result of her power, she realized that being the perfect girl wasnt perfect for her.
Some may say that Kamala is still conforming to gender roles. They may also say that she
follows her parents gender expectations of her and that shes too used to her culture and thats
why she covers herself up more. On page 16, we see that Captain America made her realize that
her classmates laughed at her even when she tried to be more like them by disobeying her
parents, culture, and religion and she regretted it. Throughout the five issues, Kamala was always
fully clothed. The only time she wasnt was when she first transformed into her ideal woman.
This may show that Kamala is conforming to the norms in her familys culture where women
must cover up most of their body. Although this may be true, it could also just be that she only
dresses that way because its a part of her identity. Her parents sheltered her from normal teenage
activities so its safe to assume that she dresses this way because she feels comfortable doing so.
Furthermore, when she transformed into her perfect woman, she didnt feel comfortable at all
and changed her appearance as the story progressed. This may also apply to the fact that she
doesnt transform into the perfect girl because she feels comfortable being herself. Going back
to Renzetti and Curran in Women, Men, and Society, parents expect their daughters to be well
behaved (79), but we constantly see Kamala breaking their expectations so that she can fulfil her
duty as Ms. Marvel.
Last, but not least, Kamala uses her powers to do things that society thinks that girl
wouldnt normally do. She used her powers to take down bad guys like the shop thief on page
59. She manhandles, or roughly handled the thief, better known as Vick, and picked him up,
but tried to avoid unnecessary harm. After that whole fiasco, she rejected Brunos protection and
said But now Im the stronger one, and Im gonna protect you, that totally freaks you out. (73).

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We see that Kamala starts to do the dirty work, or work that men usually do. In todays society,
its usually men to battle conflicts especially when it involves physical conflicts, but Kamala is
breaking that norm and started to do things her own way. She did things like saving Zoe from
drowning in the water on page 29, she mans up when she decided to use her powers to save
others on page 41 and decides to use her powers to stand up to the villains she faces, and fights
the bad guys by herself on pages 79 and 99. In Collinss Hegemonic Masculinity and black
Gender Ideology, she talks about how real men are expected to be forceful, analytical,
responsible, and wiling to exert authority (226) which is exactly what Kamala does after she
gets her powers. She is forceful when she stops the villains, shes analytical when she trains to
fight them, responsible for protecting the ones close to her, and exerts her authority to show that
she is the alpha when she confronts the antagonists. To hide her identity, she trains in a waste
field as seen on page 106. Waste fields are one of the most unsanitary places, yet she goes there
to condition her powers. It is also more unusual because in society, women should be clean.
Another article related to this topic is Lorbers Night to his Day: The Social Construction of
Gender, Lorber talks about how women are working the same jobs as men and how men are
taking care of their children rather than the mother doing so. This article can be applied to
Kamalas situation, as she is doing the jobs that the men normally do and how the people in the
comics simply accept the fact that Ms. Marvel, a woman, is making the city a better place as if
gender never really mattered since she had super powers. As you can see, Kamala broke many of
the social expectations society has for women.
Kamala was able to break many social norms as a result of obtaining her super powers.
We see this when she decides to use her powers to save others and how she hates it when she
transforms into her ideal woman. Since she had powers, she decided not to put them to waste and

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use them for good, even if it meant disobeying her parents and culture. She also never felt
comfortable when she didnt look like her real self so she stayed with looking like herself
because that was perfect enough for her. She broke many gender norms with her powers and
started doing things that men would normally do, like rescuing people and handling criminals.
Usually, men do the protecting, but since Kamala has powers and is stronger than the men who
protected her for her entire life, shes the one who will protect them.

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Works Cited
Collins, Patricia Hill. "Hegemonic Masculinity and Black Gender." Composing Gender. Boston:
Bedford/St. Martin's, 2014. 222-38. Print.
Lorber, Judith. ""Night to His Day:" The Social Construction of Gender." Composing Gender.
Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2014. 19-30. Print.
Renzetti, Claire. "Women, Men, and Society." Composing Gender. Ed. Daniel Curran. Boston:
Bedford/St. Martin's, 2014. 76-84. Print.
Wilson, G. Willow, and Adrian Alphona. Ms. Marvel: No Normal. New York, NY: Marvel
Worldwide, 2014. Print.