The Infinite Gamut of Female Protagonists

Kari wrote a post about female heroines a while back and mentioned how the characters we have been reading about are not really strong or heroic except for Juliet. I disagreed--I think most of the women we have seen have been strong in many different ways. Not all of them are agressive, and some of them deal with their problems in unconventional ways. But Juliet, Penelope, Addie, and Dewy Dell all have similarities in that they are living in a man's world and are carving out places for themselves. I decided to discuss a few different stories with female protagonists because there are many different kinds, and they do not all have to be like Juliet to be powerful.

Hua Mulan: Mulan is the stereotypical powerful heroine, and she is, like Juliet, a "bad-ass" girl who will fight for what she wants. Like Juliet, she has good motives for what she is doing and is pretty selfless, choosing to sacrifice her own life for her father's much as Juliet sacrificed her life for knowledge. Ballad of Mulan. She is working out of a sense of duty, not out of a dream for freedom.
Strength as a female protagonist: selflessly courageous and willing to fight with men
Weakness: not really doing it because she is following her own dream

Katniss Everdeen: Katniss Everdeen is also very similar to Juliet and Mulan, since she can use a bow and arrow and is willing to fight anyone to protect her family and her people. She does not like violence, but she is willing to do what she has to and ultimately becomes the leader of the rebellion that frees the people under the capitol rule. She is similarly clever and cunning, but her story is complicated by the love triangle between Peeta, Gale, and herself
Stength: strong fighter with courage and love for her family that drives her to save them
Weakness: indecisiveness that interferes with her strength, doesn't really even want to lead the rebellion

Scheherazade: Scheherazade is brave because she volunteers to marry the king who kills maidens after spending only one night with them. She is clever. telling the kings stories that are so interesting that he falls in love with her. She is standing up to the king, saving other women, and eventually earning a place in the king's heart and a role as his queen.
Strength: uses her cleverness and skills to make the best of a bad situation
Weakness: life is driven by the king's decision, eventually becomes his queen (story ends in marriage and love)

Jo March: Lives a fairly typical life for a girl in America in the 1800s, but breaks boundaries by becoming an author, acting in family plays as a boy, and eventually pursuing a life as the owner of a home for boys. She marries the man she loves. She is determined, persistent, unrepressable, and kind.
Strength: carves out her success as an author with hard work and is unwilling to sacrifice her own personality to fit in better in the time in which she lives
Weakness: life is focused around domesticity and eventually marrying and setting up house, worries about things like whether her dresses are nice or not

Clearly, there are many different types of strong women in literature, and all of them have different strengths and flaws. Because the number of women in literature has historically been low, we now seem to want to see heroines who are strong in every single way, who reject love and concerns with appearance, and who are able to make decisions and to jump into physical or metaphorical battle immediately. But male characters are complex and there are many different types of male heroes. We should embrace the variety of female protagonists, understanding that they are going to have flaws and that those flaws are not necessarily a comment on female strength.